FMT:
‘I’m not a China accountant’ says Trump when asked about virus figures
 |
President Donald Trump speaks about the coronavirus at the White House as Vice-President Mike Pence listens AP pic |
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday the coronavirus statistics China was reporting seemed “a little bit on the light side,” while his national security adviser said Washington had no way of knowing if Beijing’s figures were accurate.
The comments came after a senior Republican lawmaker cast doubt on Beijing’s data and Bloomberg News said a classified US intelligence report had concluded that China had under-reported the total cases and deaths it had suffered.
The coronavirus outbreak began in China in late 2019 but Beijing has reported fewer cases and deaths than in the United States, which now has the world’s largest outbreak, with 214,000 confirmed cases and 4,800 deaths.
Trump told a daily briefing by his coronavirus task force that he had not received an intelligence report on China’s data, but added:
“The numbers seem to be a little bit on the light side – and I am being nice when I say that – relative to what we witnessed and what was reported.”
Trump said he had discussed how China had dealt with the coronavirus outbreak in a phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping last Friday, but “not so much the numbers”.
Trump, who has toned down his criticism of China’s handling of the virus outbreak since the call, also said the US relationship with China was “very good” and both sides wanted to maintain a multi-billion dollar trade deal reached earlier this year.
“As to whether or not their numbers are accurate,” he added, “I am not an accountant from China.”
Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying reiterated during a daily briefing in Beijing on Thursday that China has been open and transparent about the coronavirus epidemic in the country and sharply criticised US officials who cast doubt on China’s disclosures.
“These comments by those US politicians are just shameless and morally repulsive,” she said. “They should abandon such politicising of public health issues. This is just immoral and inhuman – and will be denounced by people all around the world.”
Trump’s national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, told the same briefing Washington was “just not (in) the position to confirm any of the numbers that are coming out of China.”
“There’s lots of public reporting on whether the numbers are too low,” he said. “You got access to those reports that are coming out of Chinese social media … we just have no way to confirm any of those numbers.
Earlier, Michael McCaul, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, accused Beijing of hiding the true number of those impacted. He said he had called for the State Department to investigate Beijing’s “initial cover-up and subsequent actions regarding this pandemic.”
The Bloomberg report cited unidentified US officials as saying that a classified report, received by the White House last week, concluded that China’s public reporting on cases and deaths was intentionally incomplete.
China reported dwindling new infections on Wednesday and for the first time disclosed the number of cases of people who have the highly contagious disease but do not show symptoms.
The comments came after a senior Republican lawmaker cast doubt on Beijing’s data and Bloomberg News said a classified US intelligence report had concluded that China had under-reported the total cases and deaths it had suffered.
The coronavirus outbreak began in China in late 2019 but Beijing has reported fewer cases and deaths than in the United States, which now has the world’s largest outbreak, with 214,000 confirmed cases and 4,800 deaths.
Trump told a daily briefing by his coronavirus task force that he had not received an intelligence report on China’s data, but added:
“The numbers seem to be a little bit on the light side – and I am being nice when I say that – relative to what we witnessed and what was reported.”
Trump said he had discussed how China had dealt with the coronavirus outbreak in a phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping last Friday, but “not so much the numbers”.
Trump, who has toned down his criticism of China’s handling of the virus outbreak since the call, also said the US relationship with China was “very good” and both sides wanted to maintain a multi-billion dollar trade deal reached earlier this year.
“As to whether or not their numbers are accurate,” he added, “I am not an accountant from China.”
Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying reiterated during a daily briefing in Beijing on Thursday that China has been open and transparent about the coronavirus epidemic in the country and sharply criticised US officials who cast doubt on China’s disclosures.
“These comments by those US politicians are just shameless and morally repulsive,” she said. “They should abandon such politicising of public health issues. This is just immoral and inhuman – and will be denounced by people all around the world.”
Trump’s national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, told the same briefing Washington was “just not (in) the position to confirm any of the numbers that are coming out of China.”
“There’s lots of public reporting on whether the numbers are too low,” he said. “You got access to those reports that are coming out of Chinese social media … we just have no way to confirm any of those numbers.
Earlier, Michael McCaul, the ranking Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, accused Beijing of hiding the true number of those impacted. He said he had called for the State Department to investigate Beijing’s “initial cover-up and subsequent actions regarding this pandemic.”
The Bloomberg report cited unidentified US officials as saying that a classified report, received by the White House last week, concluded that China’s public reporting on cases and deaths was intentionally incomplete.
China reported dwindling new infections on Wednesday and for the first time disclosed the number of cases of people who have the highly contagious disease but do not show symptoms.
Does that mean the infected numbers from the demoncratic West, especially US, have those asymptomatic carriers included?
ReplyDeleteNO!
Simply bcoz they DIDN'T know those asymptomatic carriers in the early stage of those simplified testings due to lack of sophisticated medical test kits & time consuming result confirmation.
Just like those earlier Chinese numbers - no obvious symptoms during testing, then the suspects were cleared but later found positive. And early data from pandemic hotspots seems to indicate that many people don’t have symptoms on the day they were tested.
Besides, later recurring tests done in various parts of China, shown that asymptomatic carriers constituted a very minute portion (∼1.52%) of the total infected (Zhong nanshan CGTN interview). Surprisingly tally with the current 1500+ asymptomatic vs 85000 infected cases. (But sure to the dot that those demoncratic worshippers WOULD want to doubt the number!)
Unlike the cases NOW disclosed in the West:
*Dr. John Williams, chief of the division of pediatric infectious diseases at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Children’s Hospital, pointed out that "asymptomatic infection is common in children, occurring in 10-30%" of cases.
*Experts don’t know what portion of adults with COVID-19 are asymptomatic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield estimated asymptomatic transmission could be as high as 25%.
*Among the over 3,700 passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise liner who tested positive for COVID-19, more than 46% were not showing symptoms at the time they were tested. In Iceland, about half of the people who tested positive for COVID-19 were asymptomatic, according to one study.
And in the United States, during the outbreak at a long-term care skilled nursing facility in King County, Washington, 23 residents tested positive, despite 13 being asymptomatic that day, according to the CDC.
Now the Western demoncratic medias & politikuses r rushing to use their latest discovered asymptomatic covid-19 cases to question the numbers coming out from China!
They ignore Zhong nanshan's data & want to force their self-proclaimed figures onto China w/o mentioning that there r initially 5 strains of SARS-CoV-2 virus (now probably more variants due to further mutations). Each strain carry different infecting/killing potency!
This IS just a show of inferiority complex - how could the developed nations with top ranking WEF recognized Global Health Security Index (October 2019) for pandemic preparedness fare so POORLY when the actual pandemic happens!
What a bunch of losers, cheering on by their genuflecting minions from the East.
dun twist, its a shock to ccp when they find out most western govt reporting the truth.
ReplyDeleteOnly as seen by yr kind of boneless demoncratic ass-lickers!
Deletedun know n intentionally exclude is 2 diff thing, but of course we all know ccp china data collection is with chinese characteristics.
Deletebtw, shanghai dr zhang hongwen claim asymptomatic is 18% to 31%.
For u, a know-nothing shot from the mouth, don't know & intentionally amount to the same thing! U DON'T even know what novel virus means.
DeleteRemember that Dr Gao Fu who said the Wuhan coronavirus wasn't transmitted from human to human?
He is an US trained virologist tasked to investigate the Wuhan contagion outbreak!
How wrong was he!
So, what's yr fart about Dr Zhang hongwenx's asymptomatic claim of 18% to 31%?
Quoted from those 台湾水炮?
BTW, Zhong nanshan has just been named the winner of the Edinburgh University’s first Being Edinburgh Award!
He ain't none of those Yankee doodles cocooning farts from Formosa.
some toe party line, like zhong nanshah n gao fu, some dont, like zhang wenhong n ai fen, hope zhang hw wont go missing like ai fen.
DeleteFor a confirmed 台湾水炮 disseminator & proliferater, it's yr doggy job! Otherwise, u waste that label of know-nothing shot from the mouth.
Delete"Toe party line?"
Mfer, Zhong nanshan & Gao fu r diagonally opposite in their views!
Zhang wenhong is the one that demand CCP medical members go to the front line to fight covid-19 contagion. He go missing like ai fen - wakakakaka… 台毒 ass-licker, keeps twisting lah.
It's less than 14 days now & counting. Have u dug yr lubang yet?