China-style Lockdown in Hong Kong

Chan announced the lockdown measures this evening

China's severe lockdown practices have come to Hong Kong in a bid to keep its zero-Covid strategy. Will we see people in hazmat suits bolting down people's homes a la Wuhan next?

Tonight, some 2,700 residents in Yat Kwai House, a housing block in Kwai Chung Estate will be stuck in home quarantine for the next five days to prevent the possible spread of Omicron. There were 20 positive cases found in this residential area.

The housing block will be locked down for 5 days

Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee made the announcement this evening at at 6pm press conference -- when there's a late press conference on a Friday evening it's not going to be good news.

"We understand with this operation, people might feel there is some inconvenience such as not being able to go to work," Chan said. 

"We really appeal to employers if they have employees caught in this operation that, I hope, they will treat this in a more open and understanding manner so they won't deduct people's salary and things like that.

"The most important aim is really to identify or detect cases within the building, and secondly we want to stop the transmission chain from going further, therefore this is for the common good."

While Chan explained it was not necessary to evacuate residents because the outbreak was due to environmental contamination, not building structural issues, the main reason is because Penny's Bay quarantine camp is full.

The last time the government ordered a lockdown lasting more than 24 hours was last January, when residents in 70 blocks in Jordan could not go out for 48 hours.

People must be tested each of the five days

Residents of Yat Kwai House will have to be tested everyday for five days, and breakfast, lunch, and dinner will be provided for them. Anyone who fails to comply will be subjected to a HK$5,000 fine, and further violations could lead to a maximum penalty of six months in jail and a HK$25,000 fine.

Earlier it was reported a Pakistani woman who stayed in a quarantine hotel for 21 day became positive a few days after she came out, and already infected others. One of them was her unvaccinated husband, who went to Yat Kwai House to pick up recycling items from waste bins and infected a cleaner there. The cleaner had spread the virus across 13 floors affecting 12 households, as well as building staff.

The cleaner had had two doses of Sinovac.

Meanwhile, animal activists are trying to save as many hamsters as they can, intercepting people surrendering their rodent pets, explaining to them they legally do not have to do that. Some video footage has shown people giving their pets to these activists, who promise to look after their pets without exchanging any contact information.

Some activists protect hamsters as resistance

Some of these activists were interviewed by the media today. And while they asked to be anonymous and turned their backs to the camera while being interviewed, they also requested their voices to be altered too.

This is the state of Hong Kong now, as resisting giving up hamsters is seen as an act of dissent against the government. Even hamsters are seen as symbols of resistance...

Tonight two more pet shops have hamsters testing positive for Covid-19, I Love Rabbit in Causeway Bay and Tai Po. People who visited these shops must get tested, while staff members will have to undergo quarantine. Will another culling take place?

Remembering Fu Ts'ong and Other News

Fou Ts'ong was a well known expert in playing Chopin

An update on what happened today before getting to my main post today: 

Student activist Tony Chung Hon-lam was sentenced to four months in jail for defiling the Chinese national flag;

Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai Chee-ying has resigned as chairman of parent company Next Digital to focus more on personal affairs;

The 12 Hong Kong activists who were detained at sea for allegedly trying to escape to Taiwan by speedboat will hear their fate on Wednesday morning;

Citizen journalist and lawyer Zhang Zhan was sentenced to four years in prison for "picking quarrels and provoking trouble" for her fearless reporting in Wuhan during the height of the pandemic. She refused to cooperate with the so-called "investigation" and went on a hunger strike, and the authorities tied her hands and forced a feeding tube down her  nose;

And Hong Kong recorded 53 new cases today, but still 14 of them have unknown sources which is worrying.

Fou made London his home since 1958

This afternoon came the sad news that renowned Chinese pianist Fou Ts'ong passed away of Covid-19 in London. He was 86 years old.

I feel so privileged to see him perform in Beijing in December 2007 and my account of the concert is here.

He was very passionate about Chopin, and is considered a master in interpreting the Polish composer. In this nine-minute video you can see his enthusiasm for Chopin, and he elucidates his reason for loving his music so much.

"And I always said it always takes a genius to understand genius. Ordinary people always try to pull the genius down to their level, they don't understand the composer. There are a lot of imitators but nobody is Chopin. He is unique," he says in the video.

Zhu Meifu, Fou Lei

However, one has to think of the life Fou has been through for him to be able to interpret Chopin so beautifully. Fou's life has been full of success and praise, but also tragedy and pain.

He was born in 1934 in Shanghai and studied piano at a young age under Western pianists before winning a scholarship to the Warsaw Conservatory after taking third prize in the 5th International Chopin Competition in 1955.

Fou was the son of Fou Lei, a well-known French translator of Honore de Balzac, Romain Rollard, Voltaire, and Andre Gide. 

While the younger Fou made London his base in 1958, his father was concerned about him being so far from home and began writing letters to him -- almost 200 of them -- which were later compiled into a book called Home Letters by Fu Lei and published in 1981. 

However in 1958 Fou Lei and his wife Zhu Meifu were labelled rightists in the Anti-Rightist movement, and by 1966 when the Cultural Revolution began in full swing, both parents committed suicide.

It wasn't until 1979 after the end of the Cultural Revolution could Fou Ts'ong return to China to mourn them, and a year later gave his first concert there in over 20 years.

Fou Lei's letters to his son

Fou's personal life is interesting. In 1960 he married Zamira Menuhin, the daughter of Yehudi Menuhin, and they had one son; they divorced in 1969. Later he married Hijong Hyun, a daughter of South Korea's ambassador to Morocco that later ended in divorce.

Then he married London-based, Chinese-born pianist Patsy Toh. Sadly she was hospitalized with the coronavirus as well and tragically could not be with Fou before he died.

Watching his videos now, I wish I had an opportunity to speak with him. Musicians and artists are so passionate about their craft, and they are so keen on sharing their love of it with others. 

Fou's energy talking about Chopin five years ago shows his admiration for the composer has hardly waned;  he was still trying to understand what Chopin wrote, after decades of playing those pieces over and over again.

He is so lucky to pursue his love of music to the utmost and make it his mission to disseminate what he knows to others.

Judging from the social media posts on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram today, many are sad to hear of Fou's passing. We will all miss him dearly.

Review: Coronation by Ai Weiwei

Ai Weiwei's documentary is about the pandemic in Wuhan

 

Let's face it -- 2020 has been completely shot -- thanks to the coronavirus pandemic and we still haven't tamed the virus thanks to people in parts of the world refusing to wear masks, or governments that didn't take it seriously in the beginning.

Over 1.29 million people have died since the pandemic began December 1, 2019, when the first case emerged in Wuhan, China.

Since then it spread to over 200 countries and now there are over 52.3 million cases.

Ai and his team edited 500 hours of footage

Artist and activist Ai Weiwei documented what happened in Wuhan with the help of intrepid volunteers who managed to get unprecedented access into hospitals to record first hand what was happening on the ground months after the pandemic gripped the Chinese city.

Called Coronation, the almost two-hour documentary is a series of vignettes and interviews with Wuhan citizens who had to come to grips with the reality of the virus and the decisions local and central governments made.

I saw the documentary last night with my friend YTSL, and also in the audience was former chief secretary Anson Chan Fong On-sang, Eric Wishart of the Foreign Correspondents' Club, and lawyer and author Antony Dapiran. We were in good company.

The opening image of Coronation is stark, viewers overlooking the high-speed rail lines in Wuhan that were paralyzed by the virus, completely empty, and the dreariness of the city. Three videographers record themselves driving back to the city and encounter a lot of police checks and frozen gas pumps.

A nurse helps an elderly patient with Covid-19

There are scenes in hospital patient rooms, watching an elderly patient in critical condition because one of the machines he is hooked up to is malfunctioning, others have faces as white as a sheet and are gasping for breath while breathing in oxygen. 

One gets access to the construction site of Huoshenshan Hospital, the emergency field hospital that was built within days to house 1,000 patients. Once it's completed, one of the doctors goes inside to report to work and he walks and walks along corridors until finally he reaches his locker.

Then there is the tedious task of putting on layers of personal protective equipment. He grabs a rubber glove with air in it to make sure there are no holes before putting it on. Very smart. Another person writes with a felt tip marker on his hazmat suit that he is a doctor and what his name is.

No wonder doctors couldn't go to the bathroom with all that stuff on.

A construction worker talks to his niece

Taking the PPE off too was another routine carefully monitored by someone in another room, instructing him what to do to avoid getting the virus on his own clothes and skin. Talk about an intense and stressful procedure.

One wishes the doctor would talk to the camera, but perhaps he was too hungry, as we watch him eat. Maybe we are already lucky to have such close access that we shouldn't demand much more.

However there are other stories, like the construction worker who helped build the hospital but is stranded in Wuhan and can't get out. He is stuck living in his car and charges his phone in a car park. He calls his young niece who reminds him to disinfect himself before they see each other.

It's light moments like these that keep Coronation not too sombre.

Perhaps one of the funniest vignettes is when a videographer stays with his mother, who is a die-hard revolutionary. She insists as long as you do what you are told, you will be looked after and shows off she has won many awards. 

Her son eggs her on to show them to him and she gathers a stack of red fabric books and dumps them unceremoniously on the table. There are certificates too that are rolled up like scrolls, though one is ripped and he jokes it's because it has Lin Biao's name on it.

A videographer (right) with his mother

Then there are people angry at the government regulations for not allowing them to be with their loved ones before they passed. This was not just happening in Wuhan, but around the world. Here, people openly complain in front of the camera, telling the world that they could not say good bye, or hold their hand as they lay dying.

One middle-aged son believed the government when it said there was no proof of human-to-human spreading of the virus and brought his elderly father back to Wuhan. He was soon infected and died; his son regretful, but wishes to do his duty to give his father a proper burial.

However, his father's danwei, or work unit refuses to allow him to retrieve his father's ashes alone; he must be accompanied by minders and he is adamant that this not happen. The danwei people realize they have not handled this carefully, but at the same time the son knows they are only doing their job, but he respectfully insists that he must not be accompanied by strangers who did not know his father at all.

The government tries to "disinfect" Wuhan

It's like a cat-and-mouse game that must have been infuriating for the son to deal with, let alone his regrets and mourning. He says that the government is so big there is no way one person can beat the system.

In a way Coronation is a warning for Hong Kong. We may laugh at the ridiculousness of the bureaucracy mainlanders have to deal with, but the reality is that Hongkongers will have to face this in real life very soon. In fact things are changing so fast that it is happening now, with Beijing destroying the veneer of "one country, two systems".

The mainlanders deal with authoritarian rule everyday, and some in the film know very clearly what is going on, others blindly following along. For some the pandemic has revealed the authorities' inability to humanize the situation, that everything is for the good of the state, even though it insists it is ruled by the people.

Coronation was remotely directed by Ai; the access the videographers got was impressive, though at times the camera is blurry and there are no second takes. It is a gritty film, though not as well produced as his previous work, Human Flow, about the refugees from Syria, Lebanon and Iraq who make their way to Europe.

Nevertheless, Coronation is an excellent record of what it was like in Wuhan, something the Chinese government cannot completely whitewash.

Coronation

Directed by Ai Weiwei

1hr 53 minutes

Wuhan Closer to the Truth?

Wuhan streets are slowly getting busier, people still wear masks

Since April 8 when the 76-day lockdown was lifted on Wuhan, the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak, relatives in the city have been trying to get their loved ones' remains.

According to Radio Free Asia, the city's seven funeral homes each handed out 500 urns per day of suspected coronavirus victims, daily for 12 days from March 23 until April 5, Ching Ming, which makes the total around 42,000, more than 16 times the original death toll of 2,579.

Hundreds of Wuhanese lining up to collected ashes

But then today the Wuhan municipal government announced the new death toll was revised at 3,869, almost 50 percent more than before. It also said the number of confirmed cases was 50,333, not 50,008. In both numbers, the authorities claimed there were over 160 duplicates.

The government suggested the increased death toll was mainly because a number of people died at home in the early stages of the epidemic, as hospitals were overwhelmed by an influx of patients.

"In the early stages of the pandemic, hospitals did not have the ability to admit and treat all of the patients, a small number of hospitals did not link up with the disease prevention and control information system, many hospitals were overwhelmed trying to transfer patients and medical staff were too busy treating patients. All of these factors contributed to late reporting, failure to report and mistaken reporting," it said.

It added some organizations, ranging from the provincial government to private businesses did not report numbers in a timely way and some death registration information did not include enough details, leading to duplicated, mistaken and false reporting.

One family having a very quiet funeral for their loved one

While it is understandable that scores of people tried to get into hospitals, the fact is that many of them were possibly infected with the virus and were not officially counted either in the number of confirmed cases or the dead.

It is important to get the numbers as accurately as possible for not only China but the rest of the world to understand more about this deadly virus. But perhaps even more so for the relatives of those who died to know that their loved ones did not die in vain, that they were counted and remembered in this tragic chapter of modern China's history.

 

Carrie Announces More Relief Measures

Carrie Lam announced more relief measures for businesses to stay afloat

So many things to write about today, but perhaps most importantly a belated response from the government for more bailout measures to keep Hong Kong's economy going.

It is spending HK$137.5 billion (US$18 billion) on a raft of measures, including helping employers pay their employees HK$9,000 (US$1,160) of their monthly wages for six months. Only those companies that contribute to the Mandatory Provident Fund are eligible and they must promise not to lay off any workers.

There were questions from the media about possible loopholes, but Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor said if the list of employers was made public then employees could expect that money. This means 1.5 million workers would benefit from this scheme.

1.5 million workers could get HK$9,000 from the government

She stressed this was the third time the government was making an effort to buoy the economy, though it will cause the budget deficit to surge to HK$276.6 billion, equivalent to 9.6 percent of  gross domestic product.

"We have to try our best to prevent the closure of businesses or large-scale job cuts," Lam said as the number of confirmed coronavirus cases reached 960.

"In these unprecedented circumstances, the government must have some unprecedented responses -- to help businesses to survive, safeguard employment, and minimize the burden on businesses and citizens."

And about that controversial pay raise? Lam announced she and her senior ministers would take a 10 percent paycut for a year, which means she will be making HK$390,000 per month, or HK$4.68 million a year.

It took her long enough to decide to do that, but perhaps better late than never?

Almost 450 police officers quit last year, up 38.5 percent

Another interesting piece of news was reported that is protest related: Almost 450 officer quit during the eight months of unrest, while new hires fell short of targets.

The police force claimed it was not surprised by the large number, and added it still received some 10,000 applications.

In his budget announced in February, the financial secretary approved a 7 percent budget increase in police manpower for the next financial year, including an extra 2,543 posts created.

The Security Bureau defended the proposed budget increase, explaining that 446 officers not expected to leave the service had quit between June and February this year, an increase of 38.5 percent from the same period last year.

"For these officers, their reasons for leaving include resignation during training, early retirement, family and personal reasons," the bureau said in reply.

Were some of those "personal reasons" related to the protests?

And finally, today the lockdown on Wuhan was lifted, and as expected, some 55,000 people left the city by train, and on 100 commercial flights. People were definitely fleeing Wuhan after being shut at home since January 23.

Lots of people fled Wuhan today with the lockdown lifted

However... where are they going? There are a lot of fears many of them to show up in Hong Kong and the media pressed health officials about why they let passengers from Wuhan go home with a plastic bottle to collect the saliva sample and not have them stay at AsiaWorld-Expo to conduct the saliva test and wait for the results.

But health officials insisted that the risk assessment was low.

"Among the first batch of returnees from Wuhan earlier, only one person tested positive among some 400," Dr Chui Tak-yi, Undersecretary for Food and Health said.

However reporters in the press conference were not impressed, as anyone from anywhere could have the virus; perhaps health officials will change their mind tomorrow?

The WHO's Embarrassing Interview

The WHO's Dr Bruce Alyward stopped an interview with RTHK about Taiwan

This evening's clip of Radio Television Hong Kong's interview with the WHO's Dr Bruce Aylward have gone viral on social media because the medical expert refused to answer a question about Taiwan regarding the coronavirus.

RTHK's Yvonne Tong in a Skype interview asks the Canadian senior advisor to the Director General of the WHO about reconsidering Taiwan's membership in the organization and he feigns not to be able to hear the question, and even suggests she move onto the next question.

However, Tong repeats the question again to the physician-epidemiologist, who then he shuts down the interview, leaving the laptop screen blank.

It is an embarrassing scene. @WHO Director General, Bruce Aylward, hangs up in an interview with RTHK when he is asked about reconsidering Taiwan’s membership. Ironically, despite being so close to China, Taiwan manages to keep the #coronavirus infection and fatality rate low. pic.twitter.com/bFWRXpCyHN

— Ezra Cheung (@ezracheungtoto) March 28, 2020

 

What was that?

It clearly proves that the WHO has been co-opted by China in presenting it in the best light possible in its handling of the global pandemic that has infected over 577,000 people, over 27,500 dead.

Taiwan has handled the pandemic in the best way possible, thanks to the quick thinking of its officials and skepticism of China. It will also be another nail in the coffin for China's wish to take Taiwan back following the Hong Kong protests.

Chou Jih-haw of Taiwan's Centres for Disease Control

At a press conference earlier this week, Taiwan's Centres for Disease Control chief Chou Jih-haw says they wrote a letter to the WHO as early as December 31, asking about the coronavirus because they learned China's health care workers were getting ill, which suggested human-to-human transmission.
 "We asked them whether there's a possibility of human-to-human transmission. We indeed asked them and reminded them of the matter," Chou said. He said the WHO confirmed it had received the letter but did not respond to it.

Health minister Chen Shih-chung said fortunately Taiwan decided the same day to begin screening passengers flying in from Wuhan and activated its emergency operations centre on January 2 -- a move which health experts say helped Taiwan effective control the early spread of the virus.

In January, Chen said Taiwan sent health experts to China, but they were not allowed to see any patients or go to the markets where the virus is believed to have originated. The trip made Taiwanese officials realize they had to act quickly.

Taiwan Vice President Chen Chien-jen with Tsai Ing-wen

It also helps to point out one of those officials, Taiwan's Vice President Chen Chien-jen, is an epidemiologist and was the island's health minister during SARS in late 2002-2003.

On January 12, the WHO said there was no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission, but China confirmed this eight days later.

Chen says: "The WHO could not obtain first-hand information to study and judge whether there was human-to-human transmission of COVID-19. This led it to announce human-to-human transmission with a delay, and an opportunity to raise the alert level both in China and the wider world was lost."

So one can see why the WHO is red-faced about not taking into account the concerns from Taiwan, but still refuses to admit its mistakes. Hence Dr Aylward's shocking and disappointing handling of his interview with RTHK that was broadcast earlier this evening.

How can the WHO have any shred of credibility left after this pandemic is over?

Experts Call it the Wuhan Coronavirus

Dr Yuen Kwok-yung and his colleague have written an op-ed in Ming Pao

Hong Kong had a big jump in new cases with a record 14 today, all except one from overseas to bring the city's total number of confirmed infections to 181.

And from midnight tonight, anyone arriving into Hong Kong must self-quarantine for 14 days. Anyone who has arrived in the last week or so should be self-isolated anyway.

They ask why wild animals are still sold, cooked and eaten

Meanwhile, two top Hong Kong University microbiologists have penned an article in Ming Pao, saying there is nothing wrong with calling the coronavirus "Wuhan virus", and slammed the culture on the mainland for eating wild animals, saying mainlanders have forgotten the lessons of the 2003 SARS outbreak.

Yuen Kwok-yung and his colleague David Lung say the current coronavirus pandemic originated in Wuhan in Hubei province.

They called on people to stop forwarding rumours that the virus originated in the United States, saying this is baseless and a joke.

On the name of the virus, Yuen and Lung say it's "simple and direct" to call it "Wuhan coronavirus" or "Wuhan pneumonia". They said the virus was named COVID-19 because the World Health Organization stopped using names of people or places since 2015.

"While scientists should use COVID-19 during academic exchanges, it is easy for communication for ordinary people and the media to call it "Wuhan virus" or "Wuhan pneumonia," they wrote.

Wild animals cause coronaviruses that jump to humans

In addition the experts warned there would be a "SARS 3.0" if people in China don't stop eating wild animals.

"It's a serious mistake that tough measures were not taken and game meat markets were not closed af the SARS outbreak. One must face the truth and avoid the same mistake again to fight the pandemic. Don't blame it on others," they wrote.

The microbiologists reminded people that the SARS outbreak was linked to viruses that originated from civet cats.

"It's been 17 years. Markets selling game meat are not banned. The problem has become more serious. Mainland people have completely forgotten the lesson from the SARS outbreak. It is eyebrow-raising that there are game meat markets in the middle of developed cities, and people openly sell, cook and eat them," the article said, adding mainland's people disrespect for animals was the source of the virus outbreak.

The experts warn lessons need to be learned from SARS

It's a pretty scathing article, criticizing not only average mainlanders but also officials for not doing enough to prevent the current coronavirus outbreak.

What will Beijing say about this? Or will Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor try to rebuke the two experts? Everyone deserves to know the truth, as this pandemic has truly gone global, not only infecting over 200,000 people worldwide, but also impacting stock markets, companies and people's livelihoods.

FOOTNOTE: Just after I published this post, reporters on Twitter have reported that Yuen and Lung are retracting the op-ed because as scientists they don't want to be involved in politics...

They should have thought about the implications of what they wanted to say... or this never crossed their minds?

Xi's Orchestrated Visit to Wuhan

President Xi Jinping paid a visit to Wuhan today

The big news today, other than Italy going into complete lockdown?

Chinese President Xi Jinping traveled to Wuhan, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in Hubei province. The city has been under severe lockdown since January 23, two days before the Spring Festival.

【習近平在武漢考察疫情防控工作】今天，習近平深入武漢社區，看望居民群眾和防控一線工作人員。 （視頻：央視新聞） pic.twitter.com/FLUmP37ASF

— 人民日報 People's Daily (@PDChinese) March 10, 2020

 

Donning a mask but no gloves, Xi waved to people quarantined in their apartment blocks -- with security officers in hazmat suits in their flats to make sure they would not shout out negative things to the president, like what happened a few days earlier when local officials walked through and a woman shouted "Fake! Everything is fake!"
    
That video clip went viral on social media.

Security officials hanging out with residents where Xi was

But here Xi praised Hubei and Wuhan for containing the coronavirus and suggested that victory was in sight. And in the meantime he urged continued vigilance and all-out efforts to defeat the epidemic.

He also visited Huashenshan Hospital via video link to frontline health care workers and patients. So while the numbers of new cases have gone done considerably, Xi isn't risking his health quite yet and doing some intense social distancing. Or maybe local officials wanted to show off the grandeur of the ballroom or the technological advances in video links?

Nevertheless, he thanked doctors and nurses for their hard work. "You're radiant emissaries of hope, essentially the most lovely of angels, and true-blue heroes."

The propaganda machines were working overtime today, with state media following Xi's every move, and the message now is: "The Party and all Chinese people are grateful to Wuhan people".

Xi talking to medical staff and patients via video link

This is apparently a 180-degree turn from a few days ago when Wuhan party chief Wang Zhonglin proposed an "extensive gratitude education campaign".

According to Changjiang River Daily, Wang made the suggestion at a meeting about the coronavirus on Friday.

"[We must] be grateful for the general secretary [Xi] and the Communist Party," he said. "[We must] listen to the party, follow the party."

People online were outraged that Wang expected people to be grateful, as they had paid a heavy price for the complete lockdown of the city.

The red circles show where security officers were positioned

"The government should put an end to its arrogance and humbly express gratitude to its master -- millions of people in Wuhan," wrote Fang Fang, a Wuhan-based writer, in an article posted on WeChat.

One piece of silver lining in Xi's visit was that the stock market reacted positively -- the Shanghai Composite Index rose 1.8 percent, while the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong was up 1.4 percent.

Nonetheless, it seems not everyone was buoyed by Xi's Wuhan trip. On WeChat some users mocked his visit by sharing a video of a scene from a TV drama about Qing emperor Kangxi, where courtiers advised the emperor he should only personally lead troops into battle when final victory is all but assured...

Finding a Way Not to do Homework

A father helps his son with his homework, a daily routine in Wuhan

It's been about two months since kids in Wuhan have been in lock down because of the coronavirus and at first it was fun not to have to go to school, but now for them studying at home can be a real drag.

Children have had to attend classes online at home

They have to use an app called DingTalk developed by Alibaba that is sort of like the Chinese version of WhatsApp for the office, that is not only for communicating with colleagues but also be able to do administrative tasks like request annual leave and process business expenses.

For the students, though they need to use the app to check into their online classes, and the teachers use it to give them homework.

Boring right?

The kids somehow figured out that if enough people give a one-star rating of the app, it will be kicked out of the App Store. So tens of thousands of ratings of DingTalk came flooding in so the app's rating went from 4.9 to 1.4.

DingTalk is begging not to be killed off the App Store!

The app, which was launched in 2015, even begged the kids for mercy on social media: "I'm only five years old myself, please don't kill me."

By the way in Hong Kong, the app has a rating of 2.7...

China's Propaganda Machine in Overdrive

Medical staff in full suits looking after coronavirus patients in Wuhan

The Chinese government is anxious to show it is doing everything to battle the coronavirus, which means all hands on deck in the propaganda department.

There are video clips of mostly men who are seen dashing into police stations or government offices and dropping off boxes of masks or lots of cash and then running away.

It's meant to show people's selflessness, that they are willing to give away their life savings to the authorities to fight the coronavirus. If they ran away, how would they know all these details? Or maybe these people just robbed a bank beforehand?



The first video seemed shocking but sweet, but now there are about 41 different video clips which makes them even more staged. Why would so many people run into a police station or government office, dump bricks of cash on the counter and then run off again? It boggles the mind.

Then today CCTV has a clip of apparently two nurses decked out in full hazmat gear complete with plastic shields and blue suits yellow shoe covers in a coordinated dance outside of the hospital. Apparently they were trying to make light of the situation and enjoying a fun moment.



Really? From the clips I've seen of nurses having mental breakdowns, them dancing like children is completely off the wall and ridiculous. It's so obvious this clip was begging for sympathy.

But then there are uncomfortable video clips of more than a dozen nurses in Gansu province having their heads shaved, calling them "the most beautiful warriors!" in a bid to show their devotion to fighting the coronavirus. These women are crying, which seems to indicate they were coerced into doing this. Why didn't the men go bald too?



And there are horrific stories of nurses being forced to take birth control pills so they wouldn't menstruate (as going to the bathroom would be too much trouble), and they were chastised for asking for sanitary pads and tampons, saying they "lacked the spirit of devotion".

While the propaganda army was hoping these clips of the nurses would make the public sympathize with them, it actually enraged people that the women were being treated this way and vented their wrath online.

Young people in particular have had enough of the propaganda machine, as they can access a lot of information and clips via WeChat or going over the Great Firewall to see what people outside of China are saying about the coronavirus in their own country.

People are still very angry about Dr Li's Wenliang's death

They were particularly angry following the death of Dr Li Wenliang, who tried to warn his former classmates about the coronavirus, and were angry that the police accused him of spreading rumours.

"In the past month, many young people have been reading a lot of firsthand information and in-depth media reports about the epidemic on the internet," says Stephanie Xia, a 26-year-old in Shanghai in The New York Times. She says they are angry and confused about what they learned.

"There's some gap between what the young people are really like and what the government believes what they're like," Xia adds.

For young people today, this coronavirus and how they experienced it is much like other seminal events, like the Wenchuan earthquake in 2008, the Wenzhou train crash in 2011, the downfall of Bo Xilai in 2013.

How China's next generation is influenced by how they went through this year's coronavirus crisis will forever shape their perceptions of the Communist Party of China and their trust in the government.

One gets the feeling it's not going to be very solid...

Coronavirus Epidemic Surges Globally

Putting on a decorative mask for carnival and a mask to prevent coronavirus

The number of coronavirus cases around the world is accelerating, making people wonder if we are entering a pandemic.

It was shocking to hear of cases in Iran -- it was discovered on February 22 when a Canadian woman flew back to British Columbia who had flu-like symptoms and was later tested positive. And now Iran has at least 45 cases and 12 deaths.

Iranian women wearing masks and gloves for protection

Reports say patient zero was a merchant from Qom who regularly traveled to China, but because of the travel restrictions he flew around to different countries before getting to China and back. Patient zero has since died.

Most of the cases in Iran seem to be centered in Qom, with some unsubstantiated reports saying as many as 50 people have died there. The sudden spike in cases has raised panic in the country, where there is a lot of mistrust of the government.

Fear is also in Italy, where over 219 confirmed cases were recorded in northern Italy, in Lombardy and Veneto, near Venice. The authorities have shut down museums, schools, fairs, markets, and even cancelled the last day of the carnival in Venice.

South Korea has also seen a surge in cases too, of over 800, half of which are from the Shincheongji Church of Jesus, where apparently worshippers are not allowed to wear masks or glasses, and they must attend service even if they are sick, and after service must break out in groups for Bible study or go out and proselytize. Huh.

Tourists wear masks as they visit St Mark's Square in Venice

Several hundred confirmed cases and seven deaths in South Korea has prompted the Hong Kong government to issue a Red Outbound Travel Alert to the country. Starting from midnight tonight local authorities will not allow anyone to come into the city except for returning Hong Kong residents.

Any Hongkongers who have been in Daegu and North Gyeongsang province in the past 14 days will be subject to a 14-day quarantine in Fo Tan in the New Territories.

Seems strange the Hong Kong authorities would raise this travel alert for South Korea, but not for China which has the vast majority of the cases at over 77,000 and over 2,500 deaths...

Speaking of China, someone might have been sacked after an announcement was made lifting measures for people who are not Wuhan citizens with no symptoms to leave the city.

The Shincheongji Church of Jesus has been shut down

But four hours later the announcement was retracted, saying it has not been studied and approved by leaders, in other words Beijing.

China's internal communications are in disarray, and one wonders if the messenger overlooked telling the central government about this message before pressing the "send" button...

There are so many missteps happening -- many due to caught completely unprepared for the coronavirus possibly landing in their country to not advising residents the best way to protect themselves.

We are hardly out of the woods yet in this coronavirus epidemic...

Coronavirus Numbers Keep Rising

The roads pretty much everywhere in Beijing are empty these days

The Chinese government is desperately trying to put a positive spin on how it is handling the epidemic. It has sent out confident messages that the country is at war to beat the coronavirus and that the battle will be won.

But the story on the ground couldn't be further from the truth. For example, most of the Chinese capital is deserted with everyone at home. My Beijing friends report staying at home with their families for the past 22 days, only going outside to fetch food delivered to them.

Some people only go outside to collect food deliveries

Many people are terrified because they don't have much knowledge or information about the coronavirus, and some don't have enough protective gear like masks. A Beijing friend told me about an elderly couple who went out to buy fruits and then came back home infected. 

Another talked about how sons or daughters take care of their sick parents to the hospital and then came home, didn't wash their clothes right away and then they were infected or they spread the virus to other people in the family.

Wonder if these stories were counted in the official statistics?

China is anxious to show its number of cases are declining, especially in Wuhan, but that hope is now thrown out the window with news that over 500 people are infected with the coronavirus in five prisons in three provinces which has bumped up the total of confirmed cases to over 80,000.

The numbers of prisoners infected in China are worrying

"With a heavy heart and sense of responsibility, I am reporting to you that as of February 20, five prisons in Hubei, Shandong and Zhejiang have reported infections among their populations," He Ping, head of the ministry's Bureau of Prison Administration, said in Beijing.

More than half the cases were in Hubei province, the epicenter of the epidemic, 207 cases in Shandong, and 34 in Zhejiang.

Either the prisoners were initially infected by a new prisoner who already had the virus, or from possible visits from family? Even if someone was supposedly healthy when they were initially imprisoned, they may have developed symptoms later. And then Chinese prisons are known for being overcrowded, which make them a hotbed for transmitting all kinds of things...

So now prisons have been told to be more vigilant about monitoring prisoners' health for the coronavirus.

Already heads have rolled for the outbreak of infections. In Shandong province, Xie Weijun, Communist Party secretary of the province's Department of Justice, and seven prison officials were sacked for mismanagement of the infections. And in Zhejiang province, the provincial government said two prison officials were fired as well.

There were already unconfirmed reports of infections in prisons last weekend, and again people were punished for posting these stories online.

Passengers are slowly disembarking from Diamond Princess

Another friend I had lunch with today in Hong Kong has a lot of mainland clients and has an office in Shenzhen. He says he hasn't heard from his clients at all, while his staff are also stuck at home, though they are expected to be back at work next week.

So for now he hasn't had much to do and his superior who used to be so busy is now asking a lot of questions now that she has time on her hands...

Meanwhile in South Korea the numbers of confirmed cases have doubled to 208 today, as well as one casualty. Many of the cases are linked to Shincheonji Church of Jesus in Daegu, which is really a doomsday cult that has 200,000 followers in the country.

Did their leader know this infection might be the end of them?

Japan is getting flack for how it has dealt with the Diamond Princess cruise ship passengers. Was cooping them up on the ship the best thing to do? Or did it quickly result in hundreds of cases? It seems some among the crew could be infected.

Back in Hong Kong, my neighbourhood supermarkets and shops are having stocks of tissue paper again and wet wipes, but no toilet paper... I was tempted to buy a giant package of wet wipes when I stopped to think -- wait a second do I really need that much?

At lunchtime across from my office in Causeway Bay there was a massive line in front of a cosmetics shop called Colour Mix where they were all waiting for masks to be sold (See the above video). It seems people refuse to pay high prices and are willing to wait in line... or maybe because they have nothing else to do?

Coronavirus Spikes, Hong Kong's Leash Tightens

The number of coronavirus cases is now over 60,000 worldwide

Every morning turning on the computer and seeing the latest coronavirus numbers is a necessary but dreaded task. But this morning it was even more shocking because the number of cases was over 15,000, almost tenfold the day before to a total of over 60,000. The number of deaths increased by 254 to over 1,300.

That's because China decided to broaden the definition of cases to not only those who have been tested and confirmed to have the coronavirus, but also include those who show symptoms that make them highly suspect of having the coronavirus, or COVID-19 to enable these patients to get the necessary care and hopefully hospital bed they need.

Zhang Xiaoming has been demoted one rung down

Previously Wuhan would only get a certain number of test kits per day in a bid to slow down or make the number of cases seem smaller. But someone has somehow persuaded China that to better control the outbreak, a more realistic show of numbers is necessary so that enough aid and help gets there.

It's hard to understand -- Wuhan doctors and nurses are working around the clock -- have the PLA doctors and nurses helped relieve them? Or are they too busy manning the newly-built hospitals?

In any event, everyday the numbers are only going to keep growing -- and these are only the cases that China is willing to tell us. There could be many more they have yet to reveal...

In the midst of the release of these shocking numbers, Beijing has demoted Zhang Xiaoming from director to deputy director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office.

The new HKMAO director is now Xiao Baolong

The top position has been taken over by Xia Baolong, a vice chairman of the Chinese People's Consultative Conference and was previously Zhejiang party chief; most importantly he is a Xi Jinping loyalist.

And what is Xia known for? During his leadership in Zhejiang, he apparently issued the order to remove some 2,000 crosses from churches in Wenzhou, which is considered the centre of Christianity in China.

So... one can imagine Xia will be taking a harder line on Hong Kong than Zhang... Hong Kong's protesters will have a formidable opponent to conquer or charm.

China watchers conclude this latest move indicates Xi has changed the puppeteers, but the puppet (Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor) remains. It shows that Beijing is going to take more control over the city, than depend on the puppet to do the dirty work...

Where is Chen Qiushi?

A screenshot of Chen Qiushi in Wuhan to document the coronavirus there

People who have been following lawyer and citizen journalist Chen Qiushi are asking where he is.

In the last few days he has been missing and now he has been "quarantined" but no one knows where.

Some may remember the Qingdao native who came to Hong Kong in August to report on the anti-government protests. He made videos of the protests and posted them on YouTube, challenging state media reports that claimed all the protesters were rioters and separatists.

In August he was in Hong Kong

Instead Chen said most of them were peaceful. "Not all of them are rioters," the 34-year-old said in one of his videos.

He was summoned back to Beijing, and after he returned, he was harassed and silenced by the authorities. His social media accounts, including Weibo that had 740,000 followers, were deleted.

But he vowed to continue to speak out.

When news of the epicentre of the coronavirus was in Wuhan, Chen got on a train on Chinese New Year eve to go there and report what was happening. He promised he would tell the truth, that he would not spread rumours, that he would try to protect himself from the coronavirus the best he could, and he would not leave Wuhan if he caught the virus.

He made videos interviewing people who were sick and desperate for a hospital bed, he interviewed nurses and doctors, one of whom confirmed there were corpses in the hospital hallways covered in sheets but they didn't know if they had died of the coronavirus. He also saw the unsanitary conditions in the hospitals with used gloves, masks and vomit everywhere.

He posted videos, talking about corpses in hospital hallways

At the same time he had to watch his back with the authorities knowing he was there and didn't want him out reporting on his own. They forced him to move out of his hostel, his WeChat account would be blocked if he posted another video on the app.

And now Chen has been missing since February 6. His friend posted a video of Chen's mother the following day, saying her son had disappeared.

"I'm here to beg everyone online, especially friends in Wuhan to help find Qiushi, find out what's going on with him," she said.

Then later that evening Xu Xiaodong, a well-known mixed martial artist, posted a video saying that Chen had been forced into quarantine.

"In the last few hours the Qingdao public security officers and state security officers... notified Qiushi's parents that Qiushi has already been detained in the name of quarantine. Qiushi's' mother immediately asked them where and when he was taken away, they declined to say," said Xu.

Chen (left) with friend and MMA fighter Xu Xiaodong

Xu stressed that in his conversations with Chen, he was in good health before he disappeared.

Chen's friends worry about him, but also that he might be infected with the virus.

Are people looking for him? Will he be found? As some have said online, we cannot have another Li Wenliang...