Coronavirus: China releases 84-page report, denies delay or cover-up

China releases an 84-page report into its handling of the pandemic, concluding Beijing acted ‘in a timely manner’.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organisation, left, shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

China has insisted there has been “no delay or cover-up whatsoever” in its coronavirus response as it released a detailed report into the pandemic.

It was the country’s most comprehensive account so far, and Beijing used the document to deny criticisms that it had delayed and even sought to cover up the disease in its initial actions.

“The fact is that there’s no delay or cover-up whatsoever by the Chinese government,” said Ma Xiaowei, director of the National Health Commission, citing facts listed in the 84-page report.

“Rather, it reported virus data and related information as soon as possible to the international community, making an important contribution to the cause of the global effort against the virus,” he said.

It comes as a US senator claimed yesterdaythat Beijing was trying to block the development of a vaccine. Rick Scott, the Republican senator for Florida, who serves on the armed services and homeland security committees, said: “We have got to get this vaccine done. Unfortunately we have evidence that communist China is trying to sabotage us or slow it down.”

He told Andrew Marr on the BBC, that the information had come from US intelligence, adding: “There are things I can’t discuss.” He said that if “England or the US does it first, we’re going to share. Communist China, they are not going to share.”

The Chinese foreign ministry has repeatedly accused the US of trying to distract from its own response to the crisis and a death toll that is the highest in the world.

Ma Zhaoxu, a foreign minister, said: “Some countries smear China to deflect their own failure in fighting the virus. They’ve resorted to creating and spreading political viruses.”

Since China reported the first cases in December in Wuhan, the pathogen has swept across the globe, killing more than 390,000 people, infecting more than 6 million and affecting nearly everyone in the world with suspended transportation, closed businesses and cancelled public events.

The report made no mention of Li Wenliang, a Wuhan doctor who was admonished and silenced by local police when he tried to warn his peers of the disease in December. Without adequate protection, he later contracted the virus from a patient and died.

“As soon as cases of pneumonia of unknown causes were identified in Wuhan City, Hubei Province, China acted immediately to conduct aetiological and epidemiological investigations and to stop the spread of the disease, and promptly reported the situation,” the document states. “In a timely manner, China informed the WHO and other countries, including the US, of the developing situation.”

Ma Xiaowei emphasised that Chinese scientists had separated the strain in seven days and successfully developed a testing kit in 16 days.

The report highlighted that China checked the spread in a little over a month; the curve of the domestic cases was flattened to single digits in two months; and the decisive victory in Wuhan was secured in three months.

When asked how Beijing would repair its relationship with the rest of the world, Ma Zhaoxu insisted its ties had only been strengthened. “Our circle of friends has expanded,” he said.

THE TIMES