China
China experts in new book attempt to decipher the pandemic conundrum and the role of the communist state
New Delhi/IBNS: Several months have passed since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus and while medical researchers and scientists are racing to find a vaccine to contain the spread of the pandemic, a lot of questions are also being raised about the origin and spread of the virus.
Questions are raised on the health implications, its effect on global economy, sports and lifestyle, and above all, the political ramifications of the pandemic, including China’s handling of the pandemic and its relationship with the rest of the world.
Even though a lot of documentation has been put out in the scholarly and public domains, there appears to be a lack of comprehensive presentation of all the aspects under one title. The book ‘China and COVID-19’, published by the Pentagon Press, New Delhi, is probably the first one to plug that hole.
This volume, edited by Srikanth Kondapalli and Shaheli Das, is written by China experts, and is the first comprehensive, inter-disciplinary and area studies’ evaluation of China’s domestic and external dimensions of handling the Covid-19.
On January 30 this year, Director-General of World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the novel coronavirus (the temporary name given to the new virus which later officially became known as COVID-19) outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC), WHO's highest level of alarm.
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At that time, there were fewer than 100 cases of people infected with COVID-19 with no deaths outside of China. Since then, the number of cases has increased more than five-fold to 17.5 million, and the number of deaths has more than tripled, to 680,000.
Eighteen scholars raised at the China programme at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi, broach the subject of domestic and external dimensions of China and Covid-19 and offer in-depth analyses of the spread of the contagion, by utilising extensively Chinese language and other sources.
The first section is focused on the Covid-19 origins and development, governance issues, economy, media coverage, armed forces responses, utilisation of hi-tech gadgets in addressing the Covid-19 and impact on the sports- all within China.
The second section is about the external dimension – the spread of Covid-19 to several countries and regions – with focus on Taiwan, United States, Russia, Europe, Japan, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia, Latin America and Africa. Policy responses of these countries as well as relations with China in addressing Covid-19 are also highlighted.
The editors and some of the China experts from JNU held a special discussion on the book on Aug 7.
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