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Comment by dylan-m | Hacker News Reader

Taking that quote at face value: at the time, they trusted the Chinese authorities. This isn't terribly unreasonable. I think in retrospect we can say, yeah, they obviously shouldn't have trusted the Chinese authorities then, and they definitely shouldn't trust them in the future. But at the time, the idea that trusting them was a bad idea was more a thing people said than something backed by solid evidence.

Alas, sometimes large bureaucracies take a while to catch up with common sense. (See also, fax machines).

There actually is solid, undeniable evidence now, which is great! Let's see how they apply that in the future.

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Do we have evidence though, still? Remember, this is a hoax, Right?

Someone didn't listen to common sense and the available Intelligence also.

>Do we have evidence though, still? Remember, this is a hoax, Right?

Trump did not call COVID19 a hoax. He called what Democrats said about his administration's response to the pandemic a "hoax", akin to the "impeachment hoax" (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/29/joe-biden-trum...).

A somewhat fair point, but it was also mixed with poor choice of words and general inaccuracies at the time: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-coronavirus-rally-re...

Are you saying there wasn't a campaign to call the virus a hoax?

Taiwan did so well because they knew that Chinese authorities couldn't be trusted; and they shared their info with WHO that they suspected human-to-human transmission very early, only for it to be ignored. There was plenty of reason to not trust Chinese authorities, they have an obvious track record

'Health officials in Taipei said they alerted the WHO at the end of December about the risk of human-to-human transmission of the new virus but said its concerns were not passed on to other countries.'

https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6...

[paywalled - but going via a google search gets round it]

'Wuhan virus probably is spreading between people (2020-01-04)

Wuhan officials also said on Friday that no evidence of human to human transmission has been found so far.

But Ho said it is possible that the virus can be passed from person to person, and this is likely to have already happened in the Wuhan outbreak.'

https://news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/component/k2/1500994-20200104.h...

'Wuhan pneumonia: what we know about the new virus and how you can stop yourself getting sick (2020-1-9)

Dr Ho Pak-leung, from the University of Hong Kong, said the new coronavirus was believed to be spread through droplets.

"The public should wear disposable surgical masks in crowded places," Ho said. "They should also clean their hands frequently."

https://today.line.me/hk/article/Wuhan+pneumonia+what+we+kno...

'Q&A with HK microbiologist Yuen Kwok-yung who helped confirm coronavirus' human spread

Tell us what you saw in Wuhan (on 17th Jan).

Let me tell you what I think is the truth. All the places we visited in Wuhan looked like they were putting on a show. Whatever we asked them, they answered as if they had prepared hard with well-thought-out replies. However, Zhong Nanshan was extremely sharp - he kept asking follow-up questions, like: "Is there anything else?" "Are there any more cases?" "Is it really like you're saying, just that many cases?"

Eventually, under pressure, they relented and told us it seemed that there was one patient in the neurosurgery department who had infected 14 medical workers. But they also said those medical staff had not had their diagnoses confirmed.

...

We met a deputy-level national leader and officials from the National Health Commission. They were all quite frank. Our expert group reported that the situation was severe, and there must have been cases of human transmission, and that preventive measures needed to be taken immediately.'

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/exclusive-qa-wit...

> 'Health officials in Taipei said they alerted the WHO at the end of December about the risk of human-to-human transmission of the new virus but said its concerns were not passed on to other countries.'

> https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6...

The Guardian disagrees: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/caught-in-a-su...

> “Why did the WHO Ignore an email from Taiwanese health officials in late December alerting them to the possibility that coronvirus could be transmitted between humans?” the president asked in a tweet on Friday, echoing a claim made by Taipei.

> However, the Taiwanese email appears to have made no such warning. It was sent from Taiwan’s CDC to its WHO liaison officer on 31 December, hours after the first official report of a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan were published online.

> According to the text provided to the Guardian, the email said: “News resources today indicate that at least seven, atypical pneumonia cases were reported in China.”

> It restates the details of Chinese report, adding “I would greatly appreciate it if you have relevant information to share with us.”

> The email did not contain new information, and certainly nothing about human-to-human transmission. The WHO had picked up the same report on the night of 30 December and was urgently seeking more information. On 1 January it activated its incident management support team, putting the organisation on an emergency footing.

I feel like this whole "it said/it said" thing with all these various organizations and their shifting messages is going to take years, at least, to disentangle.

Thanks for the update, I haven't looked at it for a while, these were my bookmarked sources from that time:

https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3904054

https://news.yahoo.com/taiwan-accuses-failing-heed-warning-1...

'The officials said doctors in Taiwan had learned from their colleagues in mainland China that medical staff were falling ill from the as-yet unnamed coronavirus, a sign of human-to-human transmission that Taiwan says it passed on to the WHO and Chinese authorities on December 31. However, the WHO did not communicate the information with other nations.'

So I guess it comes down to semantics; whether a mention of atypical cases and request for confirmation is effectively a warning - or not.

Whatever the interpretation, it seems like the lack of response from the WHO to that email indicates the WHO were in the dark at the time, or not willing to share what they had. If the former then the email could be said to have formed a warning of some kind.

>https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/18/caught-in-a-su...

I love how The Guardian tries to twist the facts in the service of an anti Trump screed. Personally I feel the report from Reuters was far more balanced (it doesn't even mention Trump)

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-taiwan...

(curious about the downvotes btw...)

Here was the email Taiwan sent to the WHO at the end of December:

“News sources today indicate that at least seven cases of atypical pneumonia were reported in Wuhan, China. Her health authorities responded to the media that they did not believe the cases were SARS; however, the examples are still under study and the cases were isolated for treatment. I would greatly appreciate if you have relevant information to share with us. Thank you very much for your attention in this matter. ”

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