5 plagues have come out of China in the last 20 years, U.S. National Security Advisor says

The economic damage of coronavirus pandemic could be at least $4.1 trillion, or almost 5% of global gross domestic product, depending on the disease’s spread through Europe, the U.S. and other major economies, according to Bloomberg, citing a report from Asian Development Bank. The report does not include over 300,000 precious lives lost to the deadly disease. The question is, why do so many epidemics originate in Asia and Africa? And why are there so many plagues coming out of China?

According to US National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, as many as five plagues have come out of China in the last 20 years. O’Brien is probably being too generous. According to the information on WHO website, there are at least five plagues that came out of China during the last 20 years. According to the information US National Institutes of Health (NIH) website, China was influenced by all the five influenza pandemics that had occurred during the past century.

Five influenza pandemics had occurred during the past century (1918 “Spanish flu” , 1957 “Asian flu” , 1968 “Hong Kong flu” , 1977 “Russian flu” and 2009 H1N1 Pandemic), accounting for hundreds of millions of people infected and tens of millions dead. China was influenced by all the five pandemics, and three of them (1957 “Asian flu” , 1968 “Hong Kong flu” and 1977 “Russian flu” ) were originated from China. The pandemics triggered the establishment of public health agencies and influenza surveillance capacities. In addition, more resources were allocated to influenza-related research, prevention and control. As a leader in the field of influenza, China should further strengthen its pandemic preparedness and response to contribute to global health.

O’Brien added that at some point it has to stop. “I think we know it came from Wuhan, and I think there’s circumstantial evidence that it could have come from the lab or the wet market, but again, if you’re China, neither one’s a good answer,” he said. “We’ve had five plagues from China — in the last 20 years,” O’Brien told reporters at the White House on Tuesday.

People across the globe are going to rise up and tell the Chinese government that “we can no longer have these plagues coming out of China,” whether it is from labs or wet markets, neither one is a good answer, O’Brien

“We’ve had five plagues from China in the last 20 years. We’ve had SARS, avian flu, swine flu, COVID-19 now and how longer can the world put up with this terrible public health situation that you’ve got in the People’s Republic of China that is being unleashed on the world,” O’Brien told reporters at the White House on Tuesday.

“I mean, this is — at some point, it’s got to stop. We offered to send in health professionals to help the Chinese. They rejected that,” he said. “Look, China’s got to figure out how to deal with its public health because we cannot have another one of these virus outbreaks and plagues come from China. This was a terrible thing that happened to the entire world, not just to the United States,” he said.

More than 300,000 people have died from the deadly coronavirus and over 4 million people infected around the world.  “They need help from the rest of the world. And we’re prepared to help China deal with the public health crises so we don’t face this issue again,” O’Brien concludes.