Bias undermines solidarity in virus fight: China Daily editorial

That outside of Hubei province, the most hard-hit area, the number of new novel coronavirus infections has dropped each day for 12 days in a row, to 166 as of Sunday, indicates the epidemic situation is largely being brought under control.

Even in Hubei, the number of new infections each day has dropped over the past four days, to below the level before the complicated genetic lab diagnosis was replaced by faster CT scans, which led to a jump in the number of confirmed cases. This is heartening news as the province has borne the brunt of the epidemic which broke out in the provincial capital Wuhan in late December.

But while the epidemic situation in the province as a whole may be easing, the fact that the city's share in the province's number of deaths remains at about 79 percent and it accounts for 83 percent of the people infected in the province shows that it is still suffering the most and remains the stronghold of the virus.

Undoubtedly, it was the lockdown of Wuhan since Jan 23, that has helped the country to keep the virus contained largely within the city; and it is the country's efforts — the whole nation has come to a virtual state of standstill for nearly a month — that has helped win the world a window of opportunity to curb the virus' spread.

This opportunity has been won at a huge cost — 1,666 people had been killed by the virus in China as of Sunday, according to the National Health Commission, which does not include those who passed away before being confirmed of infection with the novel coronavirus due to the lack of sufficient testing kits in Wuhan and elsewhere in the province. And by Friday, a total of 1,716 medical professionals had been infected with the virus, among whom six have died.

People throughout the country extend their condolences to the families and friends of those who have died, and their appreciation for the self-sacrifice of Wuhan residents.

But some outside the country, prefer prejudice to empathy and they vilify the Chinese people, the country and its governance system. These China-bashers turn a blind eye to the country's efforts to prevent the virus spreading — efforts whose scale and efficiency are enabled by its system — and point to the infections outside the country, about 1 percent of the total, to hype up the epidemic as symptomatic of the China threat they are peddling.

And it is because of them that the World Health Organization has repeatedly had to urge some developed countries to share their data and join in the war against the virus.

Such biased and immoral views are against the interests of the world, as they directly shake the foundation for the international solidarity that is needed to defeat the virus.