While I’m thinking about Covid-19, let me have my say about whether calling it the “Wuhan virus” is somehow “racist.” The answer is no.
Having visited China on several occasions, it doesn’t surprise me the country spawns new and uglier diseases. I remember vividly visiting a Chinese “teaching hospital” in a group of four tourists which also included the other DrC, a western physician, and his friend, a hospital administrator.
In this ‘esteemed’ institution there were near-full spittoons in the hallways and dried mucus on the walls above them where people had missed. You could smell the toilets several doors down the halls. And the staff proudly displayed an iron lung, which our young physician had only heard about, never seen.
On that same trip, I saw a tour boat busboy washing dishes in the same Li River into which the boat’s toilets emptied. It didn’t do much for my appetite.
To this cultural indifference to microorganisms, add a cuisine which includes nearly everything plant or animal that’s not immediately poisonous. The result is a near-perfect incubator for cross-species transfer or “cross pollination” of disease organisms.
In short, I’m never surprised when a new disease surfaces in China. It isn’t racist to be critical of Chinese sanitary practices or the resultant diseases. China is an enormous Petri dish.
