|
Front Page of the Day
Intestinal virus kills 19Posted by Eric Mu, April 28, 2008 11:15 PM
Fuyang's back in the news again, less than one week after the "White House" scandal (see Danwei's report). Today's Liaoshen Daily reprinted a Xinhua report on an intestinal virus outbreak in Fuyang. The big photo shows a health inspection van parked outside of a kindergarten. To the right of the image, a headline reads "DEATH" (死亡) in large, bold type. Rumors about an epidemic in Fuyang started in early March. Some people thought it might be bird flu, which hit the city in 2007 and infected one person. Some called it "Children's SARS" because the victims were young children. Other people believed it was foot-and-mouth disease, because the infected had rashes on hands and feet. Some parents sent their young children out of the city. People rushed to drug stores for chemical sterilizers. A kindergarten which enrolled 40 students had only 10 showing up. In response to the rumors, a local TV station broadcast two press conferences on April 15, in which government officials admitted that there were "several deaths due to respiratory infection," but denied that it was an epidemic. They said the deaths were independent (insinuating the disease was not contagious) and there was no increase in number compared with previous years. However, the government's soothing words flew in the face of the fact that information on how to prevent hand, foot and mouth disease (caused by the EV71 virus) was being posted on the walls of the state-run kindergartens. In addition, body temperatures were checked and the parents of kids whose symptoms fit the profile were asked to remove their children. In one kindergarten, after a child died, a meeting was held and the staff were warned that whoever leaked the news would be fired. On April 27, Xinhua finally confirmed the outbreak of EV71. By then, 19 children had died from the outbreak and 204 remained in hospital, including four in critical condition. In total, 789 were struck by the virus, most of them younger than two years old. With SARS still in the back of people's mind, the whole thing may sound familiar. In 2003, when China was criticized for being secretive and withholding information, the government pledged to construct an "open and transparent" epidemic reporting system. Five years from then, how far has that system come? Based on the Fuyang incident, one has to wonder. Links and Sources
|
Partner Links
Jobs in China
Recent Comments
AllSeeingE on
Send a postcard to the future
Peter Andr on
Cats and dogs in the animal cruelty law
hanmeng on
Al Jazeera on potential dog meat ban
singingblu on
2012: a disaster movie not suitable for children
NINGT on
Goons and thugs
Len Chiu on
The body in the lake
Christie on
Pole dancing: for fitness, not about sex
China Media Timeline
Major media events over the last three decades
Danwei Model Workers
![]() Recommended blogs and new media
Books on China
Diamond Hill by Feng Chi-shun: Feng's memoir Diamond Hill describes an era of gambling and gangsters, Suzie Wong and squatter villages, fires and food stalls, and the Kowloon Walled City and its white powder. "A time when people were poor, but life was rich," he says. The world that he grew up in no longer exists, but his book - the first ever on the Diamond Hill refugee settlement, in either Chinese or English - offers a candid picture of what life was like for most Hong Kong residents in the 1950s.
William A. Callahan's China: The Pessoptimist Nation: China: The Pessoptimist Nation shows how the heart of Chinese foreign policy is not a security dilemma, but an identity dilemma. Through a careful analysis of how Chinese people understand their new place in the world, the book charts how Chinese identity emerges through the interplay of positive and negative feelings in a dynamic that intertwines China's domestic and international politics.
The WTO ruling: a half victory at best: In August 2009, a World Trade Organization panel ruled against China's system of monopoly control over entertainment products. Was this the victory supporters hailed as the dawn of a new day for American and global entertainment companies in the China market?
Front Page of the Day
A different newspaper every weekday
From the Vault
Classic Danwei posts
+ Street hawker cries of Beijing (2006.12): Yang Changhe demonstrates hawker's cries in a video shot by Muzimei. + New Weekly: Do Chinese kids know anything about traditonal Chinese culture? (2004.06): Q: Do you know what China's four great inventions are? Paper, printing, the compass and gunpowder 49.3% know all four, 37.3% get one or more wrong, 13.3% don't know at all (2004.06.12) + Some questions about SARFT's full-stop for Red Question Mark (2007.09): SARFT axes Red Question Mark (红问号). He Dong (何东) responds.
Danwei Archives
Danwei Feeds
Via Feedsky
or Feedburner |





Comments on Intestinal virus kills 19
Sooo, when are the demonstrations against Xinhua starting for spreading lies. CNN did it to China, which is understandable, but Xinhua doing it to it's own people everyday is sick. Too bad one cannot trust even the date on the Xinhua produced news.
Threre used to be saying in Soviet Union about their main newspapers: There are no news in Pravda (Pravda=truth) and no truth in Izvestja (=news)
Pravda nyet izvestia, Izvestia nyet pravda.