Gaki N Me If you love to talk about the world, love Asian idols, this is the place.

I am sure a lot of you interested in Taiwan affairs already know that the World Heath Organization does not accord even observer status for Taiwan. In the present constant state of alert of the avian flu spreading, with possibilities of it traveling from birds to human, this is very scary. And the culprit behind it is of course China who refuses to allow two Chinas to be represented.

It pains me just to read the news report from mainland China.  

Taiwan Not Entitled to Attend World Health Assembly: FM Spokesman

Taiwan, as a province of China , is not entitled to participate in the activities of the World Health Organization (WHO), a UN organization only for sovereign states, including the World Health Assembly (WHA), the Foreign Ministry said Monday night.

"This is a fact known to all," said ministry spokesman Sun Yuxi, following the unanimous decision of the 54th WHA earlier Monday to exclude from its agenda a proposal submitted by a handful of countries, including Honduras, to "invite Taiwan to attend the WHA with observer's status."

This once again smashed the Taiwan authorities' scheme to participate in the WHA and other activities of the WHO, Sun said.

The proposal was nothing but an attempt to create "two Chinas," or "one China, one Taiwan" within the WHO, he said, adding that this is against the relevant resolutions of the UN Assembly and the WHA, and the general principles of international law.

It is definitely objected to by the Chinese government, the Chinese people and all the nations of the world who uphold justice, and disdained by the international community, said the spokesman.

He stressed that the Taiwan issue is an internal affair of China, and no other nation has the right to interfere in it. The Chinese government firmly objects to any party engaging in activities aimed at splitting China on the excuse of the health issue, and to any country's interference in China's internal affairs, he said.

"We firmly believe that the just cause of the Chinese government and people in maintaining national sovereignty and territorial integrity will continue to be understood and supported by countries and peoples of the world who uphold justice," said the spokesman. 
http://english.people.com.cn/english/200105/15/eng20010515_69952.html

or here
http://www.chinaembassycanada.org/eng/xwdt/t37255.htm

Last year, China signed a memorandum of understanding with the WHO last year in response to demands that disease prevention should know no borders.  But guess what? While Taiwan managed to attend the Tokyo conference, China blocked its attendance at the Beijing conference. Read the article below.  

Until the day Taiwan has returned officially to China, Taiwan should still be a separate entity.  How could the world let this pass by them.  What is wrong with the world? Just because China is economically strong? China fxxx this up and if migratory birds which stops by Taiwan infect them rendering them helpless, the whole world will be fxxxed.  Period.  

Taiwan, make up your mind if you want to join your motherland, and if not, fight all the way. Go and vote for what you really want.  Don’t let the world bully you around please.  It’s so painful for us overseas Chinese to see such political posturing by China.  It smacks of a sense of political greed.  It’s painful to watch a whole nation of Chinese people being shunned by the world.  My heart cries for all of you, truly.  

Extra articles:

Beijing's aggression

Jaushieh Joseph Wu is the Minister of Mainland Affairs, Council of Taiwan

http://www.taiwandc.org/washt2006-01.htm  

 Editorial: Grant Taiwan WHO observer status 
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2006/03/15/2003297488 

Information Division Director Makes Case for Taiwan WHO Membership 
Director Wang pointed out that, although the recent outbreak of SARS sickened six people in Taiwan, help from the WHO was slow in coming. This tardiness was a direct result of Taiwan not being a member of the WHO
http://www.roc-taiwan.org/atlanta/press/20030410/2003041001.html 

Here is a site from Hong Kong that has a lot of Flu information.
http://www.fluwikie.com/pmwiki.php?n=Science.Science  

These are very up to date flu science website at the moment.
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/bird-flu
http://www.scidev.net/dossiers/index.cfm?fuseaction=dossierItem&Dossier=24&CFID=10686495&CFTOKEN=95934920 
 

In case you are not aware, it has been reported recently that WHO’s scientists keep data to themselves and do not share it with the world so that they could be the first to publish.  The researchers’ claim to fame are through such articles.  But if the information is openly shared, breakthrough might have come earlier.  I’ll be writing a review of a book called The Wisdom of Crowd soon and you will see what I mean.

http://www.scidev.net/dossiers/index.cfm?fuseaction=dossierreaditem&dossier=24&type=3&itemid=480&language=1

Scientists Call for Release of Sequences
http://www.fluwikie.com/pmwiki.php?n=Opinion.ScientistsCallForReleaseOfSequences 

Shared data are key to beating threat from flu 
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7084/full/440605a.html 

In the meantime, in November 2005, China was not very cooperative when 6000 of its migratory birds died. 

China Withholds Key H5N1 Bird Flu Data 
http://www.recombinomics.com/News/07200503/H5N1_China_Cover_Up.html 

And of course due to poor monitoring, despite 22 outbreaks of avian flu across 10 provinces across China, they claimed only 3 human cases being affected two of which were fatalities.  Unofficial sources claimed that the true figure should be 300 deaths and 3000 people placed in isolation.  Read this article in detail.
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/bird-flu/dn8372-official-chinese-bird-flu-deaths-could-be-tip-of-iceberg.html 

Now read this.  

          China is home to bird flu
          New Scientist.com, 11 February 2006

A MASSIVE analysis of flu viruses has finally confirmed what everyone suspected: the H5N1 virus has been circulating in Chinese poultry for over a decade.  

Yi Guan at Shantou University, China, and his colleagues studied samples from 13,000 migratory birds and 50,000 market poultry in south-east China between January 2004 and June 2005. They found H5N1 in around 2 per cent of apparently healthy ducks and geese, and also in some chickens.  

 

Most importantly, the virus's genes formed geographic clusters that differed slightly between the Chinese provinces of  Guangdong , Hunan and Yunnan, suggesting that it must have been circulating long enough to have evolved into different strains.

"They found H5N1 in around 2 per cent of ducks and geese, and also in some chickens” 

The study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0511120103), pinpoints Guangdong and neighbouring Guangxi and Hunan provinces in south-eastern China as the probable source of the virus, as H5N1 there shows the most genetic variation. The virus then "colonised" other areas: viruses from Thailand and Vietnam are most similar to viruses from Guangdong, while Vietnam appears to have been repeatedly invaded by H5N1 from Guangxi province, most recently in 2005. In the past Chinese officials have insisted that H5N1 exists only in isolated cases in China, and did not necessarily originate there. 
http://www.newscientist.com/channel/health/bird-flu/mg18925383.100-china-is-the-home-of-bird-flu.html 
 

 

Come on, China. Clean up your act!  Or you won’t even have people attending 2008 Olympics.