Working and living in Hong Kong, I have been constantly 「smuggling」 news between mainland China and the rest of the world since the Covid-19 outbreak, hoping to get around the firewall to pass important information to Chinese citizens who desperately need it, at the same time, translating what happens in China to the global audience.
In mid-January when the Chinese New Year was approaching, I had such high hopes on my return to mainland China to spend time with my family. I didn’t expect that my plan would be disrupted by the coronavirus outbreak and that the country would be in grip of a public health and trust crisis. Now, people are living with the dread of Covid-19 all around them and have no idea of how it will all turn out.
Several cases of unknown pneumonia were reported to both Hubei province’s and national Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) early in December but not much was known by the public. In early January, 41 cases were found with one death. China reported the cases to the World Health Organization and researchers shared the genome sequence of the novel virus to a global virus research platform.[1] On Jan.1 and Jan.3, the two health authorities ordered researchers to hide the virus samples, Caixin News reported on Feb.27.[2]
Until Jan. 20, Beijing warned low-level officials not to cover up the outbreak. The number of confirmed cases surged to hundreds overnight.[3] Before that, the public had not been informed of the outbreak and what they can do to protect themselves.
As the number shot up, I decided to cancel my flight tickets, knowing that the reported number was just an iceberg. Since then, I have been calling my parents each night to make sure they are fine.
I started to send the research by microbiologists at the Imperial College London[4] on Chinese social media. The research predicted that at least a thousand people would be infected. My post was blocked. So I flipped the screenshots vertically and sent them out. Unblocked. Some Chinese netizens forwarded my post. Some questioned the math models the experts used. Some believed the Western experts were just trying to make China look bad.
In late January, Chinese state media stood up to criticize the local governments in Hubei province for cover-up, saying that if people were told earlier, the outbreak would not get as bad as it was, the only cure to the public panic is information transparency, and anyone who deliberately hides the reporting of cases would be 「nailed on the pillar of shame for eternity.」 [5]
The fact that Chinese media could get its calls out signaled that the Chinese authorities began to intentionally loosen the control over information. This is a common practice of soothing public anger after disasters such as the Wenchuan Earthquake in 2008 and the Tianjin factory explosions in 2015.
I wouldn't miss this opportunity. Apart from my daily formal job of covering stories in Asia for readers outside China, I also share news unavailable in China on my Chinese social media. I wrote an article on my personal blog, explaining how the outbreak developed, how the Wuhan government missed the best time to contain it and what we can do to hold the officials accountable. I wrote, 「The crisis is a test not only of the ability of citizens』 oversight but also of governance in China.」
At the same time, I 「smuggled」 the latest clinical data published on Lancet to my Chinese friends. The English screenshots of the data could get around online screening of sensitive words and be translated through mobile apps after my friends received them. But some experts』 prediction, reported by Nature, of the worst scenarios, couldn’t get through the check.[6]
After the lockdown of the city of Wuhan on Jan.23, panic buying happened in mainland China. My parents in the city of Wenzhou believed these people overreacted, though they couldn’t get any masks at drug stores either. My parents optimistically believed the outbreak was under control. But from Jan.23 to Jan.29, about 33,000 Wenzhou residents doing business in Wuhan returned to Wenzhou, which became one of the most affected cities outside Hubei province. I sent epidemiological estimates to my parents every day and shouted at them, 「It will get worse! Stay at home!」
In Hong Kong where only a few Covid-19 cases were confirmed, people also started panic buying[7] as the Hong Kong government declined to shut down its border with China.[8] In my neighborhood, disinfectant, hand sanitizers, surgical masks were all sold out. Senior ladies rushed to the supermarkets and bought any noodles, rice, and toilet papers they could find. During the outbreak, these necessities worth more than currencies.
After the news company that I work for issued notice of working from home, I filled up my fridge with food that I could eat for a week. This gave me a sense of security. I tried to not got out often to save my surgical masks. I felt like a billionaire, with groceries, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, and 40 masks.
After Wuhan’s lockdown, a series of problems were exposed. Thousands of cases were confirmed, the overburden hospitals in Wuhan ran out of beds, testing kits, and other medical supplies, asking for donations. Those ill desperately asked for help online could not get diagnosed.[9]
A friend of mine living in Xiangyang, a city close to Wuhan sent me a message, saying that she was worried about her mom working as a nurse in a hospital without any N95 respirator or protective clothing and that her relatives couldn’t get diagnosed in hospitals in Wuhan.
Chinese around the world sourced tons of protection gears and shipped them to Wuhan. My friends who study in the U.S. worked with other Chinese international students to send medical supplies back to China. Every friend of mine shared on social media the list of items that hospitals in Wuhan need.
But the hospitals didn’t receive many supplies, because the Ministry of Civil Affairs required all donations go through government-backed charities and forbade any grassroots organizations and private logistics companies to ship the supplies into the city. The government-backed Red Cross was under fire. With only about 20 staff and an outdated logistics system in Wuhan, it couldn’t handle such a large amount of supplies and discrepancies were found in its reporting of donations. Chinese state media CCTV even caught a local official who took away a box of 3M masks at Red Cross』 warehouse.[10]
The public burst with anger. Medical workers were risking their lives at the front lines, and Red Cross, which has records of embezzling funds over the past decades [11], still had not distributed equipment to medics.
In early February, I made a vlog about the trust crisis of China’s Red Cross, explaining how it handled the supplies, the history of its corruption, and how it became the monopoly of charities. Surprisingly, my video passed the check, and was viewed 67,000 times on a Chinese video platform, within a day. Hundreds of viewers commented, supporting me to keep up speaking out and saying, 「Sister, please protect yourself.」
A few days later, pressured by billions of Chinese netizens, the Red Cross Society let a logistics company take over its job. The professional team sorted out and delivered the supplies within four hours.[12]
The overall trust crisis wasn’t over.
The public anger and grief reached the climax on Feb.6 when the whistleblower Dr. Li died from the coronavirus and more than 20,000 people were infected. On Dec.30, Dr. Li warned his fellow doctors about the Sars-like virus in a private WeChat group. On Jan.3, the Wuhan police silenced and reprimanded him for 「spreading rumors.」[13] Before his death, he said to Caixin News, 「There should be more than one voice in a healthy society.」[14]
Chinese millennials, who were seen as apathetic towards politics, burst out fury and mourned the hero. As the beneficiaries of China’s economic growth and globalization, they used to be proud of their homeland though they know the model is not perfect.
But at that night, on Weibo, Twitter-like Chinese social media, hashtags of 「Dr. Li has passed away」 had 670 million views, and about 2.7 million posts with hashtags of 「we want the freedom of speech」 appeared. Many young people cried and started to think about how come their government’s reactions to disasters are always hiding information, and why the Chinese officials are only accountable to the top rather than the general public. But the next morning, all the posts disappeared.
These are the systemic questions that have not been answered for years, hidden behind the applauded economic miracle. While China has achievements in terms of mobilizing resources to alleviate poverty and build infrastructure via its top-down system, the bottom-up channels have been missing. All of us are paying the price of late alarm.
That night was a sleepless night for many Chinese. Having been inundated with a large amount of bad news for weeks, being angry about all the chaos going on in China, hearing my father was coughing on the phone, and knowing Yueqing, the county in the city of Wenzhou where my grandparents live was under lockdown, I couldn’t fall asleep.
Then, Dr. Li’s death motivated hundreds of academics to sign an online petition calling Beijing to set up laws to protect the freedom of speech.[15] To pacify the public, Beijing took a rare action by sending a team from its top anti-corruption agency to investigate the death of Li.[16] But no results have been released yet.
On Feb.17, Xinhua News reported, 「This outbreak is a big test of the country's governance system.」 [17] Yep, throughout world history, pandemics changed the fate of many civilizations.
China has been stepped up measures to fight against the virus to make up its irresponsiveness at the beginning of the outbreak. Massive checkpoints have been set up, possible virus carriers have been tracked down, and mandatory 14-day quarantines have been implemented.[18]
The number of newly confirmed cases in China excluding those in Hubei province has been declining for two weeks. But local officials are facing the dilemma of containing the outbreak or resuming production to save the country’s economy.
At the same time, China tightens control on the internet. On March 1, the new Chinese internet regulations started to be implemented. Many popular blogs that, in the eyes of the readers, are not political but informative, were shut down on that day. Only information that has 「positive energy」 and is aligned with the thoughts of the authorities is allowed to go online. The rest of the information is deemed as 「improper」 or 「illegal.」
As of March 5, more than 95,000 people around the world have been infected and more than 3200 died from the virus. Infections have been found in about 80 countries outside China. South Korea, Japan, Italy, and Iran are going through similar situations that Wuhan had. For many countries, it would be much harder to carry out the same containment efforts that China has made.
During the past month, many journalists including my colleagues in Hong Kong and mainland China have been risking their health and safety, reporting from China. Although many Chinese investigative stories were forcibly deleted after publishing, some Chinese news outlets still find ways around the restrictions — while censorship is massive in China, there is always a grey area, though small.
Since Hong Kong’s autonomy is guaranteed under the one country two systems principle, getting information and publishing stories about China in Hong Kong is much easier. This allows many 「news smugglers」 like me to get the important information out, shuttling back and forth across the wall.
What do I earn as a 「news smuggler」? The profit for me is growing public awareness of what is happening to us, empathy towards those who are affected, and difference made to the society we live in. Hopefully, these smuggling efforts might be turned into better decision-making tools for my country and fellow citizens. And most importantly, I hope I can help keep documenting our collective memories, preventing them from being erased.
1 Coronavirus: How Disease X, the epidemic-in-waiting, erupted in China. South China Morning Post. https://multimedia.scmp.com/infographics/news/china/article/3052721/wuhan-killer/index.html
2 Genetic sequencing of the new coronavirus: when the alarm went off. Feb.27, 2020. Caixin News. https://archive.is/untHJ#selection-499.0-499.22
3 Warning against cover-up as China virus cases jump. Jan.21, 2020. BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51185836
4 Estimating the potential total number of novel Coronavirus cases in Wuhan City, China. Jan.17, 2020. Imperial College London. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/sph/ide/gida-fellowships/2019-nCoV-outbreak-report-17-01-2020.pdf
5 China’s credibility on the line as it tries to dispels fears it will cover up spread of Wuhan virus. Jan.21, 2020. South China Morning Post. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3046984/china-warns-cadres-cover-spread-virus-and-be-nailed-pillar
6 Coronavirus outbreak: what’s next? Jan.31, 2020. Nature. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00236-9
7 Coronavirus: Hongkongers in panic buying of rice, toilet paper and essentials as government stays mum on impending quarantine measures. Feb.6, 2020. South China Morning Post. https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3049410/coronavirus-hongkongers-panic-buying-rice-toilet
8 Coronavirus: why won’t Carrie Lam shut Hong Kong’s border with mainland China? Feb.5, 2020. South China Morning Post. https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3049111/coronavirus-why-wont-carrie-lam-shut-hong-kongs-border
9 Coronavirus Pummels Wuhan, a City Short of Supplies and Overwhelmed. Feb.2, 2020. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/02/world/asia/china-coronavirus-wuhan.html
10 China's Red Cross is under fire for not getting supplies to hospitals fighting coronavirus. That's a problem for the government. Feb.7, 2020. CNN. https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/06/asia/red-cross-china-donations-intl-hnk/index.html
11 Does Anyone Trust the Chinese Red Cross? May 2, 2013. The Atlantic. https://www.theatlantic.com/china/archive/2013/05/does-anyone-trust-the-chinese-red-cross/275508/
12 九州通：紅會受捐物資非常複雜 調撥流程正加快. Feb.2, 2020. Yicai News. https://finance.sina.com.cn/chanjing/gsnews/2020-02-02/doc-iimxyqvy9751566.shtml
13 Coronavirus: Whistle-blower Dr. Li Wenliang confirmed dead of the disease at 34, after hours of chaotic messaging from hospital. Feb.7, 2020. South China Morning Post. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3049411/coronavirus-li-wenliang-doctor-who-alerted-authorities-outbreak
14 Whistleblower Li Wenliang: There Should Be More Than One Voice In A Healthy Society. Feb.6, 2020. Caixin Global. https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-02-06/after-being-punished-by-local-police-coronavirus-whistleblower-vindicated-by-top-court-101509986.html
15 Coronavirus: Li Wenliang’s death prompts academics to challenge Beijing on freedom of speech. Feb.12, 2020. South China Morning Post. https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3050086/coronavirus-hundreds-chinese-sign-petition-calling-freedom
16 National supervisory commission sends group to investigate issues involving Dr. Li Wenliang. Feb.7, 2020. Xinhua News. http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2020-02/07/c_138763561.htm
17 Epidemic prevention and control -- a big test and a big lesson for China's governance system and capacity. Feb.17, 2020. Guangming News. http://www.china.com.cn/opinion/theory/2020-02/17/content_75714264.htm
18 As China Fights the Coronavirus, Some Say It Has Gone Too Far. Feb.20, 2020. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/20/business/economy/china-economy-quarantine.html