China’s lack of transparency about COVID-19 in the disease’s early stages of spread prevented health officials abroad from implementing public health guidance earlier, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci told Axios.
Fauci initially suspected that the outbreak in Wuhan, China was a novel coronavirus, he told Axios, but Chinese officials reported in January 2020 that the virus that was spreading didn’t appear highly contagious, and was thought to be pneumonia. While no one may have known in full detail what the outbreak was, had China shared clearer information about their findings, especially regarding asymptomatic spread, the U.S. could have been prepared sooner, he explained.
A lack of transparency by Chinese officials played a significant role in allowing COVID-19 to spread outside China, NIAID director Anthony Fauci tells @Axios‘ @EileenOReilly10 https://t.co/S6nXEjBCkF
— Sara Fischer (@sarafischer) January 7, 2021
“Back then, the lack of full appreciation of the seriousness of what we were dealing in, was [due to] a number of reasons,” Fauci told Axios. “Some things were absolutely not known by anybody. And, some things were known by the Chinese and they weren’t very transparent about it.”
Chinese authorities have jailed doctors and citizens who documented the outbreak, while Chinese authorities actively worked to censor messages about the outbreak early on, creating a barrier that critical details about the virus’s transmissibility couldn’t easily penetrate until it spread globally. An audit from the House Foreign Affairs Committee claims that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) destroyed evidence and hid data about the virus, and suppressed healthcare professionals who tried to amplify warnings. (RELATED: China, World Health Organization Blamed For Hiding Data About COVID-19 Outbreak, New Report Claims)
Fauci told Axios that many people outside China “got fooled” because they didn’t know that the virus causing the pandemic was acting differently from SARS-CoV. People infected with SARS show symptoms, while people with COVID-19 can be asymptomatic. Had China revealed asymptomatic spread earlier, it would have “changed everything,” Fauci said, and allowed for better preparation of mask and social distancing guidance, and with contact tracing.
A team of 10 scientists from the World Health Organization (WHO) was slated to visit Wuhan in January in the wake of a new report that raises questions about whether the virus originated in a Wuhan lab, but the Chinese government delayed the team’s entry into the country. WHO’s chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus called the news “disappointing.”
World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus attends a press conference organised by the Geneva Association of United Nations Correspondents (ACANU) amid the COVID-19 outbreak, caused by the novel coronavirus, on July 3, 2020 at the WHO headquarters in Geneva. (Photo by Fabrice COFFRINI / POOL / AFP) (Photo by FABRICE COFFRINI/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Fauci also pointed to “political divisiveness” as a negative influence on public health efforts. “You get people who are making decisions about their own behavior based on political considerations, as opposed to an objective evaluation of the public health threat,” he told Axios. He emphasized the achievement of a safe and effective vaccine that is “historic in its proportion.”
Nearly 5 million people in the U.S. have been vaccinated for COVID-19, a major milestone in the fight against the disease. But the world is facing another health challenge as a new variant of the virus that is more transmissible is spreading. China reported its first case of someone infected with the variant strain in late December.