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A year later, we still know very little about how and why a new coronavirus, which killed 1.6 million and sickened 74 million people worldwide, first broke out in Wuhan, writes Yvonne Murray. In an attempt to gather more information, he traveled to the city.
Right after landing in Wuhan, an airport official boarded the plane and gestured for me, one of the two foreigners, to disembark first.
As we walked up the catwalk, he politely explained to me that I had to sign a statement that he had not left China in the previous 30 days.
With Covid-19 largely under control in China, it is now seen as an imported problem, and foreign nationals are subject to additional scrutiny, even here, in the cradle of the 2020 global pandemic.
“The weather was like this last year,” said Li, a longtime Wuhan resident, pointing to the thick gray fog hanging over the Yangtze River. “It brings back memories and makes me a little scared.”
By this time last year, the virus was already spreading rapidly among 11 million people.
Doctors, including Li Wenliang, who would later die of Covid 19, tried to raise the alarm about a cluster of unusual cases of pneumonia.
But they were disciplined by the police and told to stop spreading rumors.
New narrative
It would be several weeks before senior officials announced, on January 20, that there were indications of person-to-person transmission.
By this time, five million people had already left Wuhan for the Chinese New Year, many of them carrying the virus.
But China’s new narrative challenges this sequence of events: Wuhan, officials suggest, was the first victim of Covid-19, but not the source.
Various theories to support this narrative have been spread in Chinese state media and are gaining traction on the city streets.
“I personally believe that the virus definitely did not originate in China, because recently many cold chain food packages imported into China have tested positive for the Covid-19 virus,” said a young graduate named Wu, outside the hospital where he died. Dr. Li Wenliang. .
“So I think the virus is probably transmitted from these frozen foods,” he said.
Over spicy noodles at a busy lunch spot inside a glitzy mall, a local named Yang Rong featured another popular sight. It was first broadcast on Twitter by Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian in March.
“Wuhan hosted the military games in October 2019 and many athletes came from all over the world. We do not know which country brought the virus to Wuhan,” he said.
When pressured, she admitted that she and her friends were suspicious.
“We think it probably came from the United States,” he said.
Conquering the virus
A year later, we still know very little about how and why a new coronavirus, which killed 1.6 million and sickened 74 million people worldwide, first broke out in Wuhan.
In an attempt to gather more information, we approached scientists, university professors, government officials, and even doctors and nurses for interviews. They told us that they could not speak to the foreign media.
According to a Japanese news service, Wuhan doctors who had responded during the early stages of the outbreak had been issued a “gag order.”
Even ordinary citizens who are critical of the government’s handling of the crisis have been unable to speak.
A Wuhan resident accepted a telephone interview but said he was unable to leave his home to meet us in person.
“When I was about to walk out my door, I received a phone call from our government, who told me not to go,” he said.
“He was very upset by our government,” he added, “its oppression and withholding of information at the beginning of the pandemic were even more serious than in SARS.
But in a propaganda campaign, which is on display in a new high-tech exhibition at the Wuhan Cultural Exhibition Center, the first missteps are not mentioned.
Instead, his message is one of triumph in conquering the virus thanks to the wisdom and guidance of the Communist Party.
Here we also find the “multiple origin” theory, which has previously appeared in state media.
“By controlling the outbreak of Covid-19 in multiple locations and its rapid spread around the world,” read an exhibition plaque, “China deepened its communication and cooperation with relevant countries.”
“With concrete actions,” he continued, “we help save lives and contribute our wisdom and strength to the global fight against the epidemic.”
‘Patient zero’
To date, China has released very little information about the work its scientists have done so far to find the source of the outbreak.
The international team of the World Health Organization will soon begin its long-awaited investigation, including the search for “patient zero” in Wuhan, but many fear it is already too late.
We visited the Huanan seafood market, which was linked to several of the first cases.
Among the fruits and vegetables, some wild animals such as raccoons, bamboo rats, foxes and snakes were for sale in this “wet market”, which closed on January 1.
It was initially suspected to be the site of a zoonotic jump of the virus from an animal to humans.
But none of the animal samples tested, according to the WHO preliminary report, tested positive for SARS-Cov-2.
The trail went cold.
In the labyrinth of lanes behind the market, residents have rebuilt their lives.
“Wuhan survived, didn’t he?” laughed a man, while frying fish in chili oil.
“It was quite serious during the outbreak here,” a fruit and baijiu vendor told me, as a crowd of neighbors gathered to listen, “but China’s control measures are the best,” he said, between long puffs on a cigarette. .
“America is in chaos,” he added, much to the amusement of his friends.
No closer to unraveling the mystery
In search of answers, we also approached the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) located on the outskirts of the city.
Suspicions fell on the institute early in the epidemic, when posts on Chinese social media suggested that the virus might have been leaked during a laboratory accident, forcing Shi Zhengli, the famous Chinese virologist nicknamed “batwoman,” to speak.
“I swear on my life this has nothing to do with the lab,” he said in February.
The “laboratory leak” theory was later taken up by the US administration, but most scientists dismissed it as “pure conspiracy.”
The WIV is a world leader in the study of bat coronaviruses and one of the few biosafety level 4 laboratories licensed to handle deadly pathogens. It has received funding from the US and the EU for its pandemic prevention work.
As many scientists believe that this bat coronavirus first infected another animal before jumping to humans, we wanted to ask what investigations the WIV experts have done to find the intermediate host.
We also wanted to know if their tests had shown that this virus could have been circulating in the human population undetected for some time, which could explain why it adapted so well to humans from the start. Medical samples stored before the pandemic could contain some clues.
But once again, our request for an interview was rejected.
Wuhan has not reported a locally transmitted case for six months and the city has returned to normal.
Scars begin to heal in Wuhan.
But under the dense fog hides a mystery, that a year later, the world is no closer to falling apart.
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