A LETTER TO ISTANBULITE

Dear Istanbulites,

I greet you all.
Recent developments regarding the new type of coronavirus epidemic still remain on the agenda. Everyone is concerned because it is an infectious disease. For this reason, I would like to share some information about this epidemic with you.

The virus that caused the outbreak appeared in a seafood market located in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China. As a result of researches, we have detected the gene sequence of the virus, namely the new type of coronavirus, and shared it with the World Health Organization. This virus, which has been found to be unrelated to seafood sold in the market, is thought to be related to illegally sold wild animals in the market. But it has not yet been determined exactly which wild animal it is.

I would also like to remind you that the video shot by the Chinese woman drinking bat soup, which allegedly caused this epidemic on social media, is actually a video shot in the South Pacific in 2016. The bat is definitely not included in Chinese cuisine and tableware.

After the virus was detected, tests for virus diagnosis were developed and began to be produced to a large extent. On top of that, healthcare institutions quickly and successfully became able to identify patients infected with this virus. Based on the experience of combating SARS, the treatment method was determined with the relevant drugs available. In this treatment method, which has been developed as the fifth version so far, different treatment methods are applied to patients with critical and severe conditions, to patients whose condition is not severe.

Two private hospitals with a total of 2500 beds were built in Wuhan within 10 days and were subsequently put into service. Within 2 days, 11 cabins with 10,000 beds were converted into a hospital. In addition, isolation is applied in Wuhan City with a population of 11 million.

In other provinces in China, a first degree emergency is declared, and everyone who visits Wuhan is investigated one by one, all the people they contact after Wuhan are identified and many different measures are taken.

It has been two weeks since such unprecedented measures began to be implemented and good results began to be achieved. First, sick and suspicious cases were detected. Until February 9, 00:00 Beijing time, the number of finalized cases in China is 33 thousand 791, and the number of suspicious cases is 28 thousand 942. The news that makes us happy is that the number of newly detected patients and the number of suspicious cases decrease day by day.

In addition, the number of those recovered and discharged is rapidly increasing. At the same time, most of the finalized cases are in Hubei Province, the number of finalized cases and deaths in other states is at a much lower level compared to Hubei.

Finally, this virus has affected other countries less than China, 302 cases have been detected in 24 countries so far and 1 person has died.

The feature of this virus is that it is highly infectious but has a low lethal effect. Currently, the lethal effect of this virus is 2.1%. Most of the people who died were elderly people with sub-diseases, high sensitivity and low immunity. Looking at the lethal effects, SARS was 10%, H1N1 17.4% and MERS 34.4%.

I have heard from some Turkish friends that this virus is a biological weapon, but this virus is caused by nature.

WHO Director General has repeatedly stated that although he declared the outbreak as an international emergency, he did not even participate in the implementation of travel or commercial restrictions. According to WHO experts, the new type of coronavirus outbreak is not currently in the global outbreak format, but only at a few resource points, and is transmitted as a group. Also, it has been observed that this virus has not undergone any mutations.

While all this was happening, some countries caused chaos with their extreme reactions. The public's learning of the facts was mixed and made them even more panic. This is the main reason I wrote this letter.

Immediately after the Marmara earthquake in 1999, during my mission in the Chinese Foreign Ministry in Beijing, spending long and uninterrupted working hours, I had been in consultations to send search and rescue teams and relief supplies to Turkey. The two peoples overcame this difficulty together in solidarity. Today, during the epidemic studies in Istanbul, I saw the great support of Turkey. I believe that in addition to the medicine and powerful methods of China, we will overcome this virus with your support.

The virus is not so terrible, we detected the virus, and we began to discharge the patients. The main thing to pay attention to is panic and narrations are more scary than the virus. I would like everyone to be cool about this epidemic and to look and behave logically. The Consulate General of China in Istanbul will continue to keep you informed with the latest developments.

With my love and respect,

Cui Wei
People's Republic of China
Istanbul Consul General