Log In


Reset Password
  • MENU
    Columnists
    Friday, April 26, 2024

    Elci: 'Wuhan Flu' more accurately names virus and what it means

    The probability is high that today you've scrubbed your hands as if preparing to perform surgery, bathed in antibacterial sanitizer, bought a dozen cases of toilet paper and binge-watched seven full Netflix-produced television shows, all while hoping for the end of this God-forsaking planetary quarantine. While countries scramble to test citizens, sequester the infected and point fingers of blame, there’s one thing we know to be true: The Wuhan Virus is 100% the fault of the Chinese government.

    Before you reach for your phone to call the racist police, I'm well aware that I have broken the fundamental liberal taboo of global political correctness. However, the coronavirus was unleashed on the world at a wet market in Wuhan, China. Giving the infection a friendlier/less-offensive (politically correct) intrusive moniker like coronavirus or COVID-19 is a disservice to the rest of the world. This is China's fault and they should be held fiscally and morally responsible. Naming this pandemic the Wuhan Flu is not racist; it’s accurate.

    Scientists and infectious disease doctors believe the virus passed to humans at a wet market in Wuhan. Wet markets get their name due to the fact that the floors, stalls and tables are wet from melting ice and being constantly hosed down, often mingling with blood, wastes and other bodily fluids. The unmistakable smell of death and fear is everywhere as stressed and dehydrated animals, struggling in confined quarters, instinctually aware of their circumstances, wait to be butchered and sold.

    Chinese menu offerings include items bizarre to western tastes — featuring snakes, bamboo rats, bats, foxes, wolf cubs and even domesticated dogs. These markets pose a heightened risk of viruses jumping from animals to humans, and the spread of these pathogens are turbo-boosted by a lack of hygiene at these live-food exchanges.

    China is the country of origin and Wuhan was the epicenter producing patient zero unleashing this plague on the world. Eight Chinese scientists who tried to sound the alarm were denounced, gagged and reprimanded by authorities. A doctor who warned about the virus died of it.

    China minimized the original threat and delayed announcements and virus updates as the infections spread. China wouldn't allow world experts in their country to assess the situation and instead continued to cover up the seriousness of the outbreak. The birth of the outbreak is home to the Wuhan Tianhe International Airport and for a long time infected individuals continued to travel out of the city — bringing the virus around the globe.

    China is not an ally of the United States and it will never be a friend. Ever since Richard Nixon became the first American head of state to set foot on the Chinese mainland, the People’s Republic has undertaken the deliberative process of weaponizing capitalism. What started as a slow drip has turned into a tsunami. China produces everything, including, until recently, much of the steel for the U.S. market. Imagine the insanity of handing over steel production to a country whose goal is to gain greater world dominance.

    Chinese pharmaceutical companies supply more than 90% of U.S. antibiotics, vitamin C, ibuprofen and hydrocortisone, as well as 70% of acetaminophen and over 40% of heparin in the past decade. Generic drugs whose key ingredients are manufactured in China include medicines for blood pressure, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, epilepsy and depression.

    We don't can’t even make penicillin anymore; the last penicillin plant in the United States closed in 2004.

    In an article in "Xinhua," one of the Chinese Communist Party’s mouthpieces, a bruised Beijing threatened to impose pharmaceutical export controls stating, "America will be plunged into the mighty sea of coronavirus.”

    China has the world’s second highest number of pollution-related deaths, after India, and has no plans to quell their planetary devastation. According to the Chinese Ministry of Health, industrial pollution has made cancer China's leading cause of death. Every year, ambient air pollution alone kills hundreds of thousands of citizens. Hundreds of millions in China are without safe and clean drinking water. Amnesty International has documented widespread human rights violations, while their record of animal cruelty is legendary.

    Yet criticism of China is largely muted. The world sits essentially silent and allows Beijing to continue without criticism.

    Globalism is dangerous. China gave us the virus; we need to learn from that and eliminate our dependence on what they produce and reestablish our self-reliance and freedom. The “official” name of the novel coronavirus is COVID-19. But for me it will always be the Wuhan Flu.

    Lee Elci is the morning host for 94.9 News Now radio, a station that provides "Stimulating Talk" with a conservative bent.

    Comment threads are monitored for 48 hours after publication and then closed.