The rich hiding in villas, the poor desperate for hospital beds
BeWater(4 Feb) Mid of Dec last year, I went to China, and I got flu. I didn't usually see a doctor. I took vitamin C, drank water and slept. My friend in Beijing talked to me over the phone and told me, "Currently, many people were dead because of flu." I didn't understand, I thought it was a joke. When I looked back at that moment, they knew the spread of the Wuhan pneumonia epidemic for a long time. They had much more information than your average Joe.
At that time, I couldn't contact another friend who was a son of a Chinese official. I thought he was out of the country. When he got back to me, he told me that he caught the novel coronavirus when he was visiting a friend in a hospital. At the time, the hospitals were overflowing with patients. So his family hired a team of medical professionals to treat him at home. After 14 days of treatment, he started to recover slowly. As the virus continues to spread, his whole family no longer leave their home. They stocked food and masks in their home, and preventing they are domestic helped from going back home.
If my understanding was correct, my friends said the medical team gave him something like a "cocktail therapy". His medical team tried different medications and doses to see how his body would react. Not many could afford this, I can’t imagine what would happen if ordinary people get sick.
The life of the rich is very different from your ordinary Chinese. The rich turned their "holiday villas" into a sort of a private haven. They don’t trust the food from outside. So, they grow their own food and livestock, all are for their own consumption. They also stocked up water and masks. In short, they have supplies for roughly three months.
After New Year’s Eve, I gave them a call. Everyone asked me to send them surgical and N95 masks. I planned to fly to China for work. They told me not to come because "you don't know when you can leave afterwards". After chatting with them, they thought even if vaccines could be developed in three months, it would still take time for clinical trial and mass production. It is better to stay in their villa for a while.
Today, 1 February, the whole family of a friend in Shandong went to Australia. They all have Australian passports. I had a look at the epidemic map, and it showed that only 206 cases had been confirmed. In Shandong province, the resident population is around 100 million. My friend has businesses and investment everywhere in China. If nothing happens, will he escape? They worry if they don't leave, flights would stop then they will be stuck in China.
Taiwanese businessman: will observe for one more month, the worst case would be to exit the Chinese market
Our business in China was forced to close because the higher-ups are busy dealing with the epidemic.
I asked them if they had enough masks. They all said they couldn't buy them because Wuhan is a major transportation hub. Raw materials in the Northern part of China cannot be transported to the southern part. Even if mask manufacturers in the south are willing to run their production line 24/7, how could they operate without raw material? They entrusted their friend to acquire the raw materials overseas, and they even sent people to secure their goods. They worried that the masks couldn't be delivered. A friend in Guangdong said even the boss of a mask manufacturer doesn't have masks because they can't receive raw material for production.
Now, the worst plan is to exit the Chinese market. The focus can be shifted to South Asia and the middle east. However, the decision will be made after a one-month observation.
Source: Business Weekly TW