04/05/2003
(Clearwisdom.net) Apple Daily reported on April 5, 2003, that when SARS initially broke out in early March in Hong Kong, the Tung Chee-Wah Administration covered it up, even after five people died from it. It wasn't until a large number of residents of an apartment building fell ill, as disclosed by the Medical College of the Chinese University, that Hong Kong people realized how serious the situation was.
The reason for the cover-up is well summarized by Long Yongtu, former Deputy Minister of Foreign Economic and Trade of the People's Republic of China: "Hong Kong is the center of tourism, shipping, transportation, and finance. It needs to keep people coming to make it prosperous. If newspapers reported SARS every day on their headlines, who would come to Hong Kong? If 500,000 people fall ill, it makes sense to panic, but up to now only 300 people have gotten sick.
No wonder you've never heard about any infectious disease in Communist China and no wonder the Minister of Health Zhang Wenkang and Hong Kong Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food Yeoh Eng-kiong insisted that "The Mainland has never passed SARS to Hong Kong." and " The Mainland authorities did not cover up the epidemic situation" However, according to WHO, SARS broke out in Guangdong Province back in November last year and has spread inside China, and WHO's requests to visit Guangdong Province were rejected twice by the authorities.
Communist China's top national secrets include infectious diseases. In September 2002, Beijing resident Wan Yanhai was arrested for "leaking national secrets to foreigners" by the National Security Bureau, because he exposed the fact that tens of thousands of people were infected with AIDS in China. To Communist China, this is the most effective way to eradicate diseases such as AIDS and SARS. In any case, the disease will not affect those living in Zhongnanhai (Translator's note: the Chinese regime's leadership compound) who are forever separated from the people.
It seems like that as long as they can keep SARS a secret for another two to three months, it will be eradicated in Hong Kong, just as in China. The logical way to do it is to implement Article 23 to protect the national secrets. There are 6 million people in Hong Kong; even if 500,000 people die, there will still be 5.5 million left.
When the infectious disease broke out in Hong Kong, the only thing that the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food was concerned about was that the disease would "hurt tourism"; Recently, the Foreign Ministry of PRC, reluctantly disclosed a tiny bit of information about SARS in China, still emphasizing that "it is safe for foreigners to invest in China". All they see is their self-interest. A disaster that could have been nipped in the bud has become a full-fledged epidemic.