We can reproach what we want to the Ostrogothic influencers, to the conspirators, to the refractory to vaccination. We will be able to blame François Legault for our Christmas with 25 guests which will never have taken place, Horacio Arruda for the rapid tests which have moldy in the warehouse, Jean-François Roberge for the failures of the ventilation. But one thing is certain: they are not responsible for the appearance or the spread of the virus.
While the planet takes on the shock of a new variant and dissatisfaction rumbles in the face of governments exhausted by two years of pandemic management, we are not talking about the great unpunished of the health disaster.
A health crime against humanity
In a normal world where international law would take precedence over the balance of power, the International Criminal Court would launch the trial of the Chinese communist government these days. The indictment would be: sanitary crime against humanity. In detail, we would be talking about serious breaches of its commitments to promptly transfer information to the World Health Organization (WHO), criminal negligence having caused the death, to date, of 5.5 million people. We would note an aggravating factor: recidivism.
The task of the prosecutor would be easy, as the evidence is already in the public domain. We know that the first case of the virus, the characteristics of which were unknown, was discovered in Wuhan on 1is December 2019. During December, dozens of patients are hospitalized in Wuhan and doctors note that the virus can be transmitted from person to person, since medical personnel are affected. This is vital information.
A Chinese laboratory determines on December 26 that the virus is similar to SARS, which killed more than 700 people in 2003. Aware of this information, the National Health Commission of China, on December 30, lies and claims that it there is a “viral pneumonia” in Wuhan that has “no relation to SARS”. On the same day, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission ordered health personnel not to give any information to the public about the virus. But ophthalmologist Li Wenliang expresses his concern in his network. His message is widely distributed. 1is January, Li and fellow doctors were arrested by local police and forced to sign a confession that they “published fictitious statements” and “severely disturbed social order.”
The WHO is notified of the Chinese outbreak, not by the Beijing authorities, but by an international monitoring network, Promed, alerted by private messages from Chinese doctors. Claiming information, the WHO was officially notified on January 3 of 44 cases of “viral pneumonia” of unknown cause.
On January 5, Chinese virologist Zhang Yongzhen succeeded in genetically sequencing the virus, confirming its similarity to SARS and the likelihood of its transmission between humans. He wants to share the discovery with his global colleagues, but China’s National Health Commission has ordered that no information be released without his permission. On January 11, at the risk of his freedom, Zhang defies orders and sends the sequence to an Australian colleague, who makes it public. The dam of misinformation is broken. On January 14, 2020, the Chinese state again lies to the WHO by claiming to have found no signs of human transmission, even as, secretly, the Chinese Minister of Health advises his subordinates to “prepare for a possible pandemic “. The next day, January 15, the director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention said that “the risks of human transmission are low”. At this time, more than 1,700 Chinese healthcare workers have been infected.
It was not until January 20 that the Chinese authorities admitted that the virus was transmitted between humans. On January 23, the city of Wuhan is quarantined, confirming to the world the importance of the epidemic.
The question that kills
What would have happened if China had acted faster?
Two studies, one from Yale University, another of the British University of Southampton, indicate that the virus would have been massively contained, and its spread reduced by at least 86%, if China had imposed a containment in early January, when it already had in hand the scientific evidence on its dangerousness. A confinement in mid-January would have reduced it by 66%.
China’s guilt is all the greater because its behavior during the SARS crisis had already earned it international reprobation. The first outbreak of the virus had taken place in November 2002 in its province of Guangdong, but China did not notify the WHO of it until February 2003. The Chinese authorities had then formally undertaken to be more transparent with the WHO in the future. Broken promise.
I’ll spare you the legal details, but specialized lawyers consider that the safest approach would be for one or more member countries of the WHO to seize the International Court of Justice. If the Court agrees to hear the suit, the trial will begin. Obviously, China could refuse to defend itself and, even more, refuse to submit to judgment, which would put it in contravention of its international obligations.
Only one big question remains. Will we find in the international community one or more countries with enough guts to start this procedure? If this health crime against humanity is not worth a trial, if 5.5 million deaths are not enough to demand accountability, if not reparation, it is justice itself that will be the ultimate victim of the combined scourge of virus and dictatorship.
[email protected] ; blog: jflisee.org
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