Analysis of China-Pak relations amidst Wuhan Virus

Santosh K. Dubey.

The Novel Coronavirus is called COVID – 19. The outbreak in Wuhan City, China Province of Hubei began in December 2019. At the initial stages of outbreak it was only seen as epidemic but soon it continuously got spread to other countries and WHO considered it as pandemic (An epidemic situation but at larger scale or at the globe level causing risk to the existence of humanity) emergency, it was only limited to the boundaries of China but now it continuous to spread across the world with the early affected countries like Italy, Iran, Japan, and South Korea. Amidst the significant public health risk COVID – 19 poses to the world, WHO has declared a public health emergency of international concern to coordinate international responses to the disease. Owing to the fact that it has disrupted the Chinese economy and spreading globally.

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As the impacts of this disease is beyond Mortality and Morbidity such as causing slowing down of the economies of affected countries through interruption in production, global supply chain, limited transport services etc. influencing macroeconomic policy makers as well posing risk at the global level.
In the history of humanity it seems that once in 100 years the world is devastated by a pandemic like Coronavirus. From 1720 to 2020 how the world has been affected by pandemic such as ISLAMABAD: 1720 Plague, 1820 Cholera, 1920 Spanish flu, and now 2020 Chinese Coronavirus. All of the pandemics have one thing is common i.e. the pattern and time of occurrence which makes us think more and understand about the pandemics and which also put up lot of questions.

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As of China (The epicenter of Coronavirus), In December 2019, The COVID – 19 an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavrus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was triggered in Wuhan city of Hubei province of China and initially the cases reported were either from China or people who travelled from China posing threat to the world. As a result on 12th of February 2020 World Health Organization officially named the disease caused by novel coronavirus as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Based on the data of The CDC in the mainland of China 72,314 patients have been recorded out of which 44,672 are confirmed cases, 16,186 are suspected cases and clinically diagnosed cases. However, among the confirmed cases from COVID-19 most cases were between the age group of 30-79 years. It indicates that the aged people are more vulnerable to this novel virus. In total 1,023 deaths occurred from the confirmed cases and likely potential causes influenza, avian influenza, adenovirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus and middle east respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) were ruled out.

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As a result on 20th January, China’s National Infectious diseases Law was amended to make 2019-novel coronavirus diseases a class B notifiable disease and its Frontier Health and Quarantine Law was amended to support the COVID-19 outbreak response effort. In order to control the spread of diseases Chinese government responded in positive way by limiting the movement of the people and through development and implementation of effective control strategies. It was started to consider that the outbreak is associated with the sea food market which is the biggest market and source of food to Chinese people although it soon became clear that efficient that not only through animals but person to person was also occurring. In order to cope with the situation Chinese government including Chinese public health, clinical, and scientific communities took prompt response to allow for timely recognition and finding cure of the newly identified virus and also shared the viral gene to the world. Currently the most recommended cure for the virus is the chest CT as a major evidence for confirmed clinical diagnosis in China which has resulted in around 13,332 diagnosed cases and the most affected regions under china are southern, Eastern and north eastern part of the regions with Wuhan at the top in center.
As far as Pakistan is concerned, After declaration from the World Health Organization COVID-19 as the novel coronavirus and declaring public health emergency similar to other countries the Pakistan Government has taken several measures to deal with the spread of novel disease coronavirus.
To tackle the situation like this Pakistani government put several restrictions on movement of public and several awareness programs in order to spread awareness about the danger of the virus. In collaboration with the Federal Government and the Civil Aviation Authority the government established a system for screening and monitoring over the public. Regarding the passengers monitoring and screening Pakistan National Institute of Health is playing most significant role and regarding circulating awareness about COVID-19 detection, prevention, screening and launching awareness campaigns. However, Pakistan lacks the basic and early infrastructure related to medical related diagnostic facilities due to which as a result suspected suspects of infected samples hasn’t been tested at local center but instead transferred to foreign labs for checking and even the Test kits are provided by China. However, later Pakistan received test kits from China. As far as medical facilities are concerned according to the WHO guidelines Pakistan lacks in every field. after establishing and creating practice or teaching hospitals the beds are not enough according to the population. On the other hand media reports highlighted that most of the hospitals located in Pakistan which are being prepared for the COVID-19 violate preparedness guidelines. As compared to China and Iran with whom Pakistan share its borders unfortunately has comparatively low standard of healthcare services and facilities and the government that is also not that powerful as compared to its neighboring countries the situation will be worse in case of spread of COVID-19 as compared to other neighboring countries. Therefore, there’s only one way and that is prevention and monitoring from ministers to normal citizen of the country as “Prevention is better than cure”
The impact of this pandemic is yet to be determined on the economies of China and Pakistan, as one is the epicenter of the disease and the other has no economic, social, political or medical facilities to cope with the situation. On the other hand there is unanimous opinion that CPEC is very significant proven project for both the countries i.e. China and Pakistan. Even at the time of outbreak of Coronavirus in Wuhan, the CPEC operation was somewhere and somehow interconnected with Pakistan.
As there were many Chinese citizens who were working in CPEC in Wuhan and as a result due to outbreak got locked up in there as lockdown was announced by the government. Therefore, now it was impossible for this workers to return to Pakistan as well.
As a result it becomes very difficult and led to shutdown of business centers, factories and enterprises that were running smoothly and the impact was seen in both the countries with great concern because almost one lack Chinese experts and engineers and other working staff were linked to this project.
It was decided mutually that all the Chinese engineers and staff should sent to Pakistan and the people who were to be sent need to be kept in quarantine for almost 14 days in China and than in Pakistan.
Later, as a result the Chinese staff and Engineers arrival in Pakistan and playing their roles regarding the advantage of CPEC won the hearts of Pakistan. But in the meantime, based on public health emergency and to take prevention measures in Pakistan led to restriction of traveling of people through screening and which ultimately affected the CPEC project because weeks of delay could be tolerated but in case of time exceed it will lead to greater disadvantage.
Therefore, it shows that there are no other ways that both the countries could take regarding the negative impact of CPEC in this scenario COVID-19 which poses greater threat than ever recorded in the history of humanity at the global level.
It could be concluded that the pandemic COVID-19 is affecting the world at many fronts, whether it is in the economic, medical or political front. It has made people to adjust to new realities globally and it has been estimated that global economy could shrink to 1% in 2020 and led to economic slowdown globally. In mid of all the threats and danger international relations and geopolitics is also changing significantly. China and Pakistan are such two nations whose equation seems to be united in the crises. As the pandemic epicenter lies in China it is helping other countries to fight with this disease and supporting other nations generally Pakistan as China is delivering COVID-19 checking kits as well as all essential equipments to cope with the disease. Pakistan’s National Assembly has praised and landed China’s efforts against COVID-19.
Though, the crises has deeply impacted the world and the two nations as well. Their unification has shown their unchanging/ strategist states of ‘Iron Brothers’.
Therefore, a global response to prepare health systems worldwide is imperative. Although the containment measures regarding the diseases have reduced in China but this reduction is not same elsewhere especially in Italy as it is showing worse scenario affected by COVID-19. Based on the data from CDC, Nature, Science, Oxford and NEJM the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 is becoming unstoppable and becoming vulnerable at the global level. As a result in this situation of pandemic every nation needs to support, cooperate and work together and to fight with this situation of COVID-19.
“Stay aware stay safe and grow together”