Hong Kong's political and Wuhan coronavirus woes

How long more before the fog lifts in Hong Kong?

Sadly, I foresee the outlook being gray, even dark, for some time :S

One day after the Taiwan News reported that authorities over in Mainland China had decided to change the counting method of people infected with the Wuhan coronavirus cases to decrease the number of "confirmed cases" there, a broader definition for new coronavirus cases was implemented by local officials in Hubei province -- causing the recorded deaths and confirmed cases of infection to skyrocket so much that it all doesn't seem to make much sense any more.

That same day, the Communist Party chiefs of Wuhan and Hubei province were removed from office.  In addition, Zhang Xiaoming, the head of China's Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, was demoted and replaced by Xia Baolong, a close ally of Xi Jinping and a known hardliner: As in, when he was Communist Party chief of Zhejiang province, ordered the demolition of thousands of Christian crosses on churches there!

Suffice to say that the portends are not good for already suffering Hong Kong.  Sure, Carrie Lam did announce a HK$25 billion package of subsidies for various Hong Kongers this afternoon.  But even while HK$25 billion is not an amount to normally be sniffed at, the fact of the matter is that so much of the trouble that Hong Kong is in/facing has been her doing.  And should anyone need reminding, think: high speed rail co-location; extradition bill; the Hong Kong police allowed to run wild; anti-mask emergency law; and her refusal to close Hong Kong's borders with Mainland China (the last, like with the extradition bill, despite experts and people from different sides of the Hong Kong political equation urging her to do so).      

As things stand, a community outbreak of the Wuhan coronavirus has occurred in Hong Kong -- with a number of local human-to-human transmissions among the territory's now 56 confirmed cases of the infectious disease -- and pretty much everyone is blaming the least popular and trusted Chief Executive in Hong Kong's history for it.  Also, thanks to her administration's stupidity, Hong Kong has found itself facing a severe mask shortage; and it really does makes the blood boil to further learn that the Hong Kong government has not been responsive to the attempts of more clear thinking individuals to ensure that frontline healthcare workers have an adequate supply of protective gear.

Such is the continued desperation for masks in Hong Kong that a website which had proclaimed it could offer one box of masks to 30,000 customers ended up with 1.49 million people on at its peak.  At least, I am seeing an ample amount of fresh vegetables on sale again these days -- and packets of rice, noodles, sanitary napkins and tissue paper have reappeared on (some) supermarket shelves.  However, toilet paper remains in scarce supply (like, the Washington Post noted, trust in the government); with hand sanitizers being another prized item.

Almost needless to say, all these items never were things I worried about not being able to find to purchase just a few weeks ago.  But that's how much of an impact the Wuhan coronavirus has had on life here in Hong Kong.  Oh, and for good measure, here's pointing out that -- even while cinemas remain open in the Big Lychee (unlike over in Mainland China) -- it was anounced yesterday that the Hong Kong International Film Festival (which normally takes place in the spring) has been postponed to the summer; this following the announcement on Monday that this year's edition of the Hong Kong Arts Festival has been cancelled outright.

One last point for today with regards to that deathly coronavirus: it's recently had the name Covid-19 bestowed upon it; but even while that can be deciphered as standing for "China Originating Virus In December [20]19", I'm going to continue referring to it as the Wuhan coronavirus because, that way, it's more obvious which part of the world it did originate from rather than risk obscuring the fact.