You Don't Need Expensive Materials To Build Good Architecture

The Gallery House is designed as a garage on the ground floor with a multi-purpose space on the upper level intended to be used by people living in the area. It is a gesture from both the architect and client to give back to their community. In order to maximize the public usage of this facility, the building is extended into the street both visually and physically.

The architecture is inspired by Bengal's terracotta temples. Exposed brick masonry walls inlaid with ceramic blocks makes the building stands out from its surrounding. Collaborating with a ceramic artist, rejected ceramic blocks from factory were collected and re-used as building material for this project. Terracotta bricks were procured from a river-side brick field located nearby. These two were combined to create a unique structure out of them. The careful selection of recycled materials like the ceramic and terra-cotta tiles, the architect managed to create a high quality architecture by using inexpensive materials. This is a very good project to debunk most clients’ belief that only luxurious materials can make good building.

During the process of construction, the client decided to give up his initial intent of a garage and embraced the re-purposing of the ground floor as a community hall while the upper floor houses a multipurpose-room, a sitting area and a pantry. The multipurpose-room was to be used primarily for providing tuition classes and yoga sessions to the local community. At night, this space is used as a dormitory for resident staff. The client is proud to see the space put to good use and he is the key player in this good cause project.

This area holds a festive procession along the narrow, winding neighborhood lanes annually, a kind of local cultural celebration. To further make this building function more efficiently in the local context, the architect steps down the structure towards the street forming a gallery for public to sit while others gather at street-side during this event. Through judicious planning and play of voids in volume, the integral space of the building was shared with the neighborhood people as a humane gesture of giving back to the local community, without disrupting the privacy and security of inner functions.

This building clearly demonstrates to us that good architecture actually only needs two things – creative use of available materials and a programme that can relate to the community. How simple and wise it is.

该建筑的灵感来自于印度庙宇。利用砖砌成的墙面镶有陶瓷砖，使这建筑在它周围环境中脱颖而出。与陶瓷艺术家合作，收集了工厂不要的陶瓷块，并将其重新用作该项目的建筑材料。砖是从附近的河边砖场获得的。将这两个结合在一起，创建一个独特的建筑。在仔细选择可回收材料（例如陶瓷砖和赤陶砖）后，建筑师使用廉价的材料创建出高质量的建筑。

在施工过程中，发展商决定放弃最初的车库意图，而是将一楼用作社区礼堂，而上层则设有一间多功能空间，一个休息区和一个餐具室。多功能室主要用于为当地社区提供补习班和瑜伽课程。在晚上，此空间用作常驻员工的宿舍。发展商很高兴看到这个空间能够被大众充分的使用，感到自豪是这项目的关键参人物。

好的建筑实际上只需具备两个因素 - 有创意的材料使用以及对社会有贡献的效果。这是那么的简单和明智啊！

Chinese New Year Travel A Risk To Covid-19 Outbreaks

Train stations were swamped by people rushing back to their villages to celebrate Chinese New Year before Covid-19 times.

Before the pandemic hits, the biggest annual human migration happened in China every year during the Chinese New Year period when billions of Chinese citizens returning to their home villages from the major cities. This year due to signs of outbreaks from Hebei to Heilongjiang in the north, provincial authorities are trying to control the spread by curtailing travel in the festive season.

The plan by provincial cadres, who are urging migrant workers to “remain in cities, stay in work,” is aimed at reducing transmissions of the virus while boosting the economy at the same time.

Authorities are still fighting hard to flatten the spikes in infections, more than two weeks after China was hit by Covid-19 outbreak since early this year.

The spread of the coronavirus in rural areas of two provinces of Hebei and Heilongjiang had been under the watch of authorities for weeks until the pathogen crept into cities and provincial capitals. This week the outbreaks have pushed China’s nationwide tally of daily new cases to above 100, the highest in the past nine months after Beijing lifted the lockdown on Wuhan.

The National Health Commission (NHC) reported 103 fresh cases across the country in the past 24 hours to Friday morning.

Most of these cases were identified in repeated rounds of aggressive testing in Hebei, Heilongjiang and Jilin. The case identification system of China is different from other countries in that they do not count asymptomatic carriers as confirmed cases, a practice that has left the NHC open to criticism as the West continues to accuse China of manipulating the official figures released to the public.

The NHC’s nationwide map tracking infections on Friday red-flagged Beijing’s Daxing district, home to the capital’s sprawling new airport, and two districts in Hebei’s provincial capital of Shijiazhuang as Covid high-risk areas where the strictest lockdowns and entry and exit bans apply.

Three other smaller cities across Hebei, Heilongjiang and Jilin are also classified as hot spots of the virus. Provinces and municipalities are directed to share information and coordinate measures to curtail long-distance trips by migrant workers and others to avoid a nationwide travel rush in the run-up to the Chinese New Year celebration in February.

Chinese migrant workers who are planning to go home to the countryside have to first obtain negative test results before their trips or they risk being fined or detained.

The new rules stipulate that, after getting back to their rural homes, they will also have to undergo 14 days of “soft quarantine” with no interactions with anyone outside their families or households.

Police will be mobilized and dispatched to villages and towns to enforce monitoring and to catch anyone breaking the rules.

These measures are necessary to stem the virus from spreading into China’s vast rural areas which are poorly-funded to manage disease control. 

Hospitals and clinics in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and other major cities in southern Guangdong province have been swamped by migrant workers for testing since Thursday.

They need their negative test results to book train tickets home. The growing hoards have sparked fears of infections and local police are forced to implement crowd control measures.

More than 30 million workers from other parts of China are employed by factories in Guangdong and many are eager to go home in the Lunar New Year. That amount of people is more than the entire population of Australia!

In a desperate move to discourage people from travelling, railway operators and airlines like China Southern and Shenzhen Airlines are asked to slash departures from Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Both carriers have cancelled most flights to Beijing and Shijiazhuang. China Railway Corp’s Guangzhou branch has also rescheduled departures to make fewer seats available.

Governments and employers in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and other coastal provinces are also doling out aid and incentives to lure workers to stay, with a whole range of giveaways, coupons and even cash handouts of up to thousands of yuan on offer. 

Other incentives to encourage people to stay put in the major cities are free rides on public transport, free admission to local tourist attractions as well as a lucky draw with prizes which includes luxury sedans and iPhones etc. 

The latest “remain in city, stay in work” campaign is expected to generate more growth for the Chinese economy, with machinery humming and giveaway coupons encouraging increase of consumption.

China’s GDP is projected to grow as much as 7% in January and February 2021. In the final quarter of 2020, China’s economy expanded by 6.5%, highest in the pandemic hit world!  

Building That Looks Like Termite Mounds

The building with a strange name "50%Cloud", incorporates red brick architectural features designed by Luo Xu. This unusual structure is built on red soil completely composed of local red bricks without a single steel bar or nail. The clear benefit of using locally available materials is that the building blends into nature effortlessly. The building looks like a huge art installation with its strange roof design undulates in the sky. It looks almost like a giant termite mound from a distance. Some of its unique architectural features include curved contours and variety of spatial volumes set at staggering heights. 

The interior space extends the natural curves of the exteriors, characterized by large-span arches and lofty ceilings. Round openings are carved out on roofs to let natural daylight into the interior of the building. The interplay of daylight and cloud shadows throughout the day produces a surreal ambience inside this building and thus creates diversified spatial experiences. Almost every corners of this building are Instagram worthy.

Interior landscape further enlivens the dining atmosphere of the restaurant inside. Natural light casts onto rough bricks, softened by interior lighting and tasteful selection of furnishings, all these elements together producing an environment that encourages guests to interact with the space. The overall interior design is a multi-sensory spatial experience.

这座建筑有个很奇怪的名字叫“ 50％Cloud”，全红砖建筑给它增添了特色。这类不寻常的红砖结构毫无需要一根钢筋或钉子。利用本地材料明显的好处是，该建筑很容易的融入周围大自然。该建筑的特征在于该屋顶的独特设计在天空中起伏。从远处看起来几乎就像是一座巨大的白蚁丘。它的一些独特建筑特色包括弯曲的墙和各种不同高度设置的空间。 

内部空间延伸了外部的自然曲线，其特点是大跨度的拱形和高耸的天花板。屋顶上刻有圆形天窗，可让自然光进入建筑物里面。阳光和云影之间的互动使建筑物室内产生了超现实的气氛，从而创造了多样化的空间体验。这座建筑几乎每个角落都充满美丽的拍照空间。

室内景观提升了内部餐厅的用餐气氛。自然光投射在粗糙的砖块上，并通过室内灯光和雅致的家具布置的柔和反应，所有这些元素共同营造出一种鼓励客人与空间互动的环境。整体室内设计给出了丰富的多感官空间体验。

KL - Singapore High-Speed Rail Cancelled

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong once described the proposed KL-Singapore High-speed Rail project as a 'game changer' to the region. Sadly, the much hyped project is now cancelled following the joint-statement from both countries on the 1st of January 2021. What a terrible news to start the new year!

The stumbling block to seal the deal was mainly due to both sides were unable to reach a consensus on a number of issues. The project was initially estimated to cost about US$14.9 billion to $19.8 billion. Malaysian government seemingly wished to reduce the cost following the devastation to its economy in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The main drawcard of 350km long project is the substantial reduction in travel time to just 90 minutes compared to 4 hours by car. Official estimates show that the project could contribute about $5 billion dollars to the GDP of both Malaysia and Singapore and create more than 100,000 jobs by 2060.

The major disagreement is Malaysian government's proposed to appoint local contractors and consultants instead of having a jointly conducted open tenders process previously agreed. Singapore also cannot accept the Malaysian government's proposal to remove the third party asset company that would supply the train system and operate the railway network. As both countries have no previous experience of operating a high-speed rail network, Singapore cannot agree to the removal of the asset company.

Historically, rail projects have proved to be successful in spurring developments along the path of the networks. This project will not only benefit Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, but will serve as a powerful locomotive to bring up and stimulate developments around the various Malaysian towns along the way.

Some analysts believed that the project's termination will further erode investors' confidence towards the Malaysian government. Malaysian politics has been in an unstable situation since the Sheraton Movement Coup in February 2020.

新加坡总理李显龙曾经预测吉隆坡-新加坡高铁项目将为东南亚带来巨大好处。令人遗憾的是，在2021年1月1日两国最终宣布这个项目已被取消。新的一年却由一个坏消息开始！

双方政府无法在一些问题上达成共识。该项目最初估计耗资约149亿美元至198亿美元。由于新冠肺炎大流行，马来西亚政府似乎希望在2020年经济遭受重创后降低建筑成本。长达350公里的高铁主要吸引力在于，它将行程大幅减少至90分钟，而目前驾车则需要4小时多。官方估计显示，到2060年，该项目可为马来西亚和新加坡的GDP贡献约50亿美元，并创造10万多个就业机会。

历史告诉我们，铁路项目已成功地促进了沿网络道路的发展。该项目不仅会使吉隆坡和新加坡受益，还将会带动并刺激沿途的所有在马来西亚的各个城镇的发展。

一些分析人士就因这次事件认为，该项目的终止将进一步削弱投资者对马来西亚政府的信心。自2020年2月喜来登政变以来，马来西亚政治一直处于不稳定局面。

This Is What Thinking Outside The Box Means

Junya Ishigami + Associates considered two main characteristics while working on the outdoor plaza to the KAIT workshop of Kanagawa Institute of Technology. The architect was interested to see how the ideas of Versatility and the Semi-outdoor could be represented within this project development.

With the Versatility aspect of the plaza, the architect intended to look at it from an experiential point of view instead of a practical one. Like all other educational institutions, the existing campus is composed of several multifunctional spaces. The architect saw a gap in the programme, there was a lack of relaxation area for the students. Therefore, instead of going with a specific function in mind like a normal project would, the architect instead concentrated on what they called the ‘versatile experience’ of the space, users were free to explore different ways to spend time there. They themselves have to come up with how to pass time in this space.

The idea of a Semi-outdoor space arose to break away from conventional perception of what a school would look like. The existing campus lacked a natural diversity with ‘boring’ box buildings dotting across the site. Essentially, the architect intended to re-introduce nature back into this new space by marrying nature with architecture.

Landscape can be experienced differently by people, whether physically or mentally. The environment of the plaza was thought to be a space for people to daydream and reconnect themselves with the world beyond. The created landscape will provide an opportunity for users to enjoy the scenery and spend prolonged time looking into the expanding planes of ground where the sky would meet with the curved wall and from there the view is further extended towards the boundless world on the other side of the horizon.

There is a height difference of 2 meter between the campus ground level and this provided an opportunity to create a new ground space which will be integrated with the natural ground. The main structure was conceived as a floating expansive plane supported only by four walls, there will be no other interior support. The ground was also made concave to echo the ceiling’s bend. Both planes bend and stretch, meeting at the end and creating the horizon inside the building.

The 59 openings on the ceiling allows natural light to filter through into the space mimicking the way the rhythm of the sun shines through the clouds. Consequently, the space internally will be different depending on the time and weather. Rainy days offer an impressive scenery as the rain-flow comes in through the unglazed openings forming water pillars and adding an element of sound to the experience.

The expansive planes spans at a maximum of 90 meters, this required a lot of specific considerations in terms of structural engineering in order to make it work. Due to thermal expansion and contraction of the iron plate, the ceiling height can change up to 30cm! That is a huge deflection that the engineer has to consider in order not to break the structure under stress. There are also 83 piles and 54 ground anchors that were set on the huge concrete foundation beam, with the ground sloping at a height difference of 5m. The ceiling height is kept in the range of 2.2 - 2.8m in order to maintain the human scale within the space, while the iron plate of the roof is 12mm thick, same thickness of most furniture surfaces. Ribs are installed as compression rings within 3 meters of the roof iron plate’s outer circumference in order to reduce the burden of tension exerted on the walls. The only standard construction element of the building are the 250mm thick walls.

The ground is covered with water permeable asphalt, which is treated with high pressure cleaning to completely remove the oil before painting. This is to allow rainwater to be absorbed and flows through the plaza building, keeping the room dry so that users can still sit on it comfortably.

Sitting on the floor is encouraged so that one could better appreciate their connection to the architecturally developed environment. The architect wishes to establish a strong bond between people and nature through this building. The sloping ground is like a huge bed, allowing the body and environment to become merged into one space. This space is designed to be experienced it all together, the slope, light, raindrop sounds and the built horizon. It is an architecture that harmonize with its surrounding. This structure is to be the icon of the campus. By thinking outside the box, the architect managed to bring in so many good experiences back into the box!

建筑师 对这项目持有两个主要构思：多功能性和半户外的想法。

在多功能性方面，建筑师要从经验的角度而不是实际的角度去设计。建筑师发现这间学院缺乏一个可以让学生们放松的地方。这座新的建筑物必须能让用户自由的用各自方式来打发时间。

另一方面，半室外空间的想法是为了摆脱外界对学校外观的传统认识。现有的校园缺乏大自然因素，学校由毫无设计特点的建筑物所组成。建筑师打算通过这项目把大自然重新引入这个新空间。

人们无论在身体或精神上对周围的体验都有所不同。这广场的环境能使人们发白日梦并更亲切地接触周围世界。

校园地面之间的高度相差2米，这为创建新的地面空间提供了独特的设计方案，该地面空间将与自然地面融为一体。主要结构仅由四个墙支撑着，里面没有其他内部支撑。

天花板上的59个洞使阳光可以穿透到空间中，模仿太阳的节奏透过云层照耀的方式。因此，内部空间将根据时间和天气而有不断的在改变。下雨时，雨水会从没有玻璃的洞进入，形成水柱，其声音也增添了非凡的新体验。

学生们被鼓励坐在地板上，以便可以更好地欣赏建筑与周围的密切关系。建筑师希望通过这座建筑在人与大自然之间建立牢固的联系。那倾斜的地面就像一张巨大的床，可以将身体和环境融合在同一个空间。这建筑是一种能与周围环境协调的架构。该结构将成为校园的标志。通过有创意的思考，建筑师成功地将许多有趣的因素带进了建筑里面！

China Claims Its Vaccines Are Far More Superior Than Western Countries

China recently claimed that it was far ahead in the global race to find vaccines to stop the Covid-19 pandemic, with a handful of promising homegrown candidates either wrapping up their final-stage clinical trials or being administered in pilot inoculation schemes.

Yet reality shows that China appears to be lagging behind most Western powers as the vaccine competition heads into the final leg of regulatory approval and universal injections across the population. Both the US and UK have commenced vaccinating their citizens while Australia has brought forward their target from end of March to end of February 2021. With such programs being kick started across both sides of the Atlantic, piling pressure on Beijing.

 

Towards the end of 2020, Chinese public health watchdogs have rushed through to cut red tape and get official approval, with some conditions, for the sale of an attenuated vaccine from the Beijing-based China National Biotec Group, a subsidiary of the state-owned SinoPharm.

While granting its “conditional approval” on Wednesday, the National Medical Products Administration said its evaluation found the vaccine to be 79.34% effective and that its protection far outweighed any potential risks or side effects.

The watchdog further added that SinoPharm should diligently follow up with the drug’s wider use for post-approval assessments of its effectiveness. 

The National Health Commission (NHC) also assured China’s 1.3 billion citizens on Thursday of free and voluntary shots, albeit without a definitive timeframe.

 

NHC vice-director Zeng Yixin, Beijing’s point man on vaccine development and administration, told a State Council press conference on Friday morning that they would adopt a “phased approach” to first take care of senior citizens and those with underlying conditions, before gradually expanding to cover the masses.

Another assuring pledge from Zeng was that, while noting forming meaningful herd immunity would only require about 60% of the population – in China’s context, about 780 million people – to receive jabs, he said top leaders would beseech each and everyone to be vaccinated, given the “proven safety and efficacy” of these indigenous drugs.

The NHC also added that the other five homemade vaccines, from three technological paths, are nearing the end of their respective third-stage trials at home and abroad. 

 

Earlier this month, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain approved SinoPharm’s registration applications for sale in the two Middle Eastern countries, while Brazil and Turkey have also accredited the high efficacy rate of another attenuated vaccine developed by Sinovac, a listed pharmaceutical firm also based in Beijing.

While clearing all the regulatory hurdles for more Chinese vaccines to hit the market and enticing its citizens with a top-down, no-one-left-behind free immunization drive, the NHC has also criticized the safety of some Western drugs developed with less verified techniques.

The messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) vaccines researched by Moderna as well as Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech, which will also be marketed in China via a Shanghai-based distributor, have been called into question by the chief of China’s National Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Gao Fu, director of the Chinese CDC, reportedly said mRNA vaccines were being injected into healthy people across the United Kingdom, the United States and other parts of the West for the first time and such a large-scale roll-out was not without its risks.

Gao went so far as to suggest that Chinese authorities would not hasten its review and allow the mRNA drug to be used on such a massive scale as seen across the West.

The mRNA vaccines being progressively rolled out in the West use a copy of a natural chemical called messenger RNA to induce an immune response. They transfect molecules of synthetic RNA into immunity cells to build the viral protein that would normally be produced by a pathogen or a cancer cell.

These protein molecules stimulate an adaptive immune response to teach the body how to identify and destroy the corresponding pathogen, like the novel coronavirus.

In comparison, attenuated vaccines from SinoPharm and Sinovac use diluted and detoxified viruses to trigger an immune response, and since they are developed using existing, time-tested platforms and techniques, they are believed to be safer.

 

It is believed that by the end of the first half of 2021, Chinese people will be able to choose from homemade attenuated vaccines, likely the ones on offer for free, and the West’s mRNA alternatives.

Residents in Hong Kong and Singapore can also choose between Chinese and Western drugs in mass inoculation schemes, as both cities have placed orders with Sinovac, Pfizer and other suppliers.

Still, the global scramble for vaccines means tight supplies and production and distribution bottlenecks, as more countries count down to mass immunization.

中国最近声称在研发新冠肺炎（Covid-19）的疫苗已遥遥领先其他西方国家。

然而现实证明，随着疫苗研发还需监管部门的批准才能对全民普遍注射，中国在这方面似乎落后于大多数西方国家。美国和英国都已开始为它们的公民接种疫苗，而澳大利亚则提前它们原定的目标。随着大西洋两岸开始实施此类计划，北京目前深受尽快推出疫苗的压力。

国家卫生委员会（NHC）周四向13亿中国公民保证疫苗将会是免费而且人民可自愿决定是否被注射，尽管没有明确的时间表。

中国政府将分阶段注射疫苗，首先照顾老年人和有病的人，然后才逐步扩大覆盖整个社会群众。

中国也把目标放远世界。本月初，阿拉伯联合酋长国和巴林批准了SinoPharm在两个中东国家出售的注册申请，而巴西和土耳其也认可了Sinovac开发的另一种疫苗的高效率。

在推广中国疫苗的同时，NHC也批评了一些未经验证的西方疫苗的安全措施。

Taiping Mountain - Fairy Tale World

Taipingshan National Forest Recreation Area in Taiwan transformed into a fairy tale wonderland covered in snow.

這是童話世界吧～台灣真美. 太平山

Hong Kong Student Accommodation by Zaha Hadid Architects

 

Zaha Hadid Architects and L&O have unveiled a new design for the Student Residence Development at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, one of the leading research institutions in Asia and around the world. Created after an urgent demand for new residential facilities and halls within the campus, the project is scheduled for completion in 2023.

Designed by Zaha Hadid Architects in collaboration with Leigh & Orange, the newest additions to the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology will house over 1,500 students. Inspired by the university’s mission “to harness technology and innovation to solve today’s critical global issues”, the project combines advanced digital design technologies with sustainable construction practices and operational strategies.

Embedded within a slope of 25m, the buildings located at the southeast of the HKUST campus has 3 main components: The Central Spine, The Courtyards, and The Clusters. With a special approach to modular construction and sustainability measures integrated within the buildings, the design of the multi-courtyard multi-nodal project was determined by a set of Macro and Microscale parameters. Finally, Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Design Simulation have been adopted early on from the concept stage, with full BIM integration at the design development process to optimize the effectiveness of design coordination and material selection.

The Central Spine: The Roofline has been developed as a 200m long ‘Central Spine’ which will act as a public domain with multiple social functions such as recreation lounges, gymnasium, communal catering pod, and IT Labs - accessible to the residents, non-residential students and staff during the day. It also will be an active thoroughfare connecting the academic buildings at the north to the primarily residential south side of the campus, eliminating the need to circumnavigate the hilly terrain to get to the living quarters.

The Courtyards: The 4 courtyards at the base of the residences are envisioned to be progressively quieter breakout spaces, registering the variation of the slopes as they roll down towards the residential part of the campus. They are assigned different functions depending on the location and the landscape.

The Clusters: The Student Residence consists of 3 cluster types; Linear, V-Cluster, and Y-Cluster. Each of them has a different bed capacity, double or single occupancy bedrooms, bathroom, and configuration of communal spaces.

Source: ArchDaily

扎哈·哈迪德（Zaha Hadid）建筑师事务所和L＆O推出了他们香港科技大学学生公寓的心新设计。香港科技大学是亚洲及全球领先的研究机构之一 。该项目是在校园内迫切需要新的住宅设施和礼堂的情况下创建的，计划于2023年完成。

由Zaha Hadid建筑师事务所 与Leigh＆Orange合作设计， 香港科技 大学的最新增设 将容纳1,500多名学生。受大学使命“利用技术和创新来解决当今关键的全球性问题”的启发，该项目结合了先进的数字设计技术与可持续的建筑实践和运营策略。

这些位于科大校园东南方的建筑物将位于在25m的坡度中，主要由三部分组成：中央脊柱，庭院和集群中心。通过将特殊的模块化建筑方法和建筑物内的可持续性措施集成在一起，多庭院多节点项目的设计由一组宏观和微观参数决定。最后，从概念阶段最初就早已采用了建筑信息模型（BIM）和设计仿真，并且在设计开发过程中将BIM完全集成在一起，以优化设计协调和材料选择的有效性。

中央脊柱：Roofline已开发为200m长的“中央脊柱”，将作为具有多个社交功能的公共区域，例如休闲休息室，体育馆，公共餐饮平台和IT实验室以便学生和工作人员使用。这条通道将北部的学术建筑与校园的主要住宅南侧连接起来，从而无需绕过丘陵地带即可到达生活区。

庭院：住宅底部的4个庭院被构想为安静的空间，记录了当斜坡向下倾斜到校园的住宅部分时的变化。根据位置和风景，为它们分配了不同的功能。

集群：学生宿舍由3种集群类型组成；线性，V形和Y形。每个房间都有不同的床位，双人或单人卧室，浴室以及公共空间的配置。

China Blocks WHO

China has yet to explain why it delayed approval for a World Health Organization (WHO) team of experts to visit the country, significantly at a time when state media publish claims that the coronavirus pandemic started elsewhere.

The WHO team’s members were supposed to arrive in Beijing this week and possibly make a field visit to Wuhan, where Covid-19 cases apparently first emerged a little more than a year ago and before the disease began its lethal global spread.

The unexpected delays triggered today rare criticism from WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who said he was “deeply disappointed” by the delay in issuing visas for the team.

Ghebreyesus said that the 10-member group could not enter China for an epidemiological survey of the novel coronavirus, a key part of the WHO’s endeavor to ascertain the likely origins of the respiratory disease.

He said the infectious disease experts, led by food safety and zoonotic diseases scientist Peter Ben Embarek, were still waiting for their visas to travel to China.      

Reports indicate Embarek made a sortie to the country in July and convinced Beijing to open its doors to WHO personnel to conduct a prognosis probe.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Tuesday in response to a media question that she had “no new information” on the WHO team’s trip and itinerary.

Instead, Hua reiterated Beijing’s latest line, first purveyed by Foreign Minister Wang Yi, that “more signs and studies worldwide” had suggested Covid-19 could have “multiple sources” and that the pandemic had erupted globally across “multiple locations” since the second half of 2019.

Hua said related surveys have indicated a much earlier emergence of the pathogen in many more places than previously thought. She also hoped other countries could make “joint efforts” with the WHO to trace Covid-19 to its source. 

“We hope scientists can uphold professionalism and truth to find [Covid-19] origins worldwide, and that other countries can cooperate with and assist [the WHO] like what we have been doing since day one,” claimed Hua.

While several WHO officials and experts like Embarek were indeed allowed into China in 2020, Wuhan was glaringly and constantly missing on their Beijing-approved itineraries.

It’s not clear yet that the delay in the WHO expert team’s arrival reflects a change in policy by Beijing.

In December, the state-run nationalistic Global Times revealed a WHO “advance team” could go to Wuhan in January to inspect a wet market trading in exotic wildlife in the city that is believed to be a possible origin of the virus.

The paper also cited WHO officials as saying that all team members from Japan, Qatar, Denmark, Russia and others would first be put in quarantine in Beijing for 14 days. It added that an “open, fair” WHO investigation would help debunk the “mudslinging, fake news and conspiracy theories about the ‘China virus’” being spread by some American politicians, not least outgoing US President Donald Trump. 

“Wuhan was the first city, via Beijing, to have notified the WHO of the virus and an outbreak since the end of 2019 and well into January 2020, but that does not necessarily mean Wuhan was the source,” said the paper, a sister publication of the top Communist Party mouthpiece the People’s Daily.

A source with Shanghai’s Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention told Asia Times that one possible reason behind the delayed trip could be the outbreaks of the virus hitting Hebei province since the New Year.

He said the National Health Commission has scrambled a contingent of top virologists to the northern province to trace hidden cases and contain any spillovers that may affect Beijing. Some of these experts originally planned to accompany their WHO counterparts during their trip in China, including to Wuhan. Hebei has reported 34 local infections since Tuesday.

“With cases flaring up again near Beijing and the national health authority responding to the big resurgence, clearly receiving a WHO team is no longer a top priority,” said the source. 

Reports indicate that one WHO expert decided to cancel his flights and return to Geneva, where the WHO is headquartered, fearing he could be left cooling his heels at the airport after landing in China.

Another expert is now reportedly stuck in a transit county, apparently waiting for word on the team’s visas.

Xi Jinping visited Wuhan during the Pandemic in 2020.

In the meantime, Chinese and Western officials continue to trade Covid-related accusations and recriminations.

US President Trump again used the term “China virus” in his New Year’s speech. In China, a new narrative from a senior Xinhua editor is also making the rounds on social media.

This comes after Zhao Lijian, Hua’s colleague at the Chinese Foreign Ministry, leveled outrageous allegations at the US military, claiming they first bought the virus to Wuhan.

Xiong Lei, a deputy director of Xinhua News Agency’s special feature division, posted on social media what she claimed were findings of her investigative reporting into a Harvard-led DNA sampling project that was held in eastern Anhui province in the 1990s.

In her post, Xiong alleged that the number of DNA samples collected during the Harvard project in Anhui, reportedly funded by the US National Institutes of Health, was three times larger than the amount approved by the Chinese government and that two types of samples had been used for respiratory disease studies.   

She went so far as to suggest that the SARS pandemic of 2003, which mainly hit China, and the Covid-19 contagion in Wuhan, could have something to do with the Harvard School of Public Health’s collection of DNA and biological samples from the Chinese population.

“China has never collected DNA samples from foreign populations. So it’s preposterous for some in the US government and institutions, which collect such samples from overseas, to suggest that the Covid virus could have been engineered and manufactured in a bio lab in Wuhan,” said Xiong.

Harvard has repeatedly denied all accusations when Xiong first linked its Anhui project to SARS a few years ago, stressing the project, initiated by an associate professor of public health who hailed from China, had been approved by Beijing before it started in that province.

Nonetheless, many Chinese netizens believe Xiong’s claims have “plausible elements” given her capacity as a Xinhua senior editor and her father’s background as a spy chief in Mao Zedong’s Red Army during China’s civil war in the 1940s.

Source: Asia Times

至今中国尚未解释为什么它会推迟批准世界卫生组织（WHO）专家访问该国，耐人寻味的是中国官方媒体选择在这个时候发表有关冠状病毒大流行可能开始于其他地方的言论。

世卫组织团队的成员原定于本周抵达北京，并可能对武汉进行实地调查。武汉市显然在一年多前就出现了Covid-19病例，当时该病尚未开始蔓延到全世界。

对于这次的延误，世卫组织总干事特德罗斯·阿德诺姆·盖布里亚索斯今天罕见的表达不满和批评，他为该团队签发签证的延误“深感失望”。

Ghebreyesus说，这个由10名成员组成的小组无法进入中国进行新型冠状病毒的流行病学调查，这是WHO确定这病毒起源的关键部分。

他说，由食品安全和人畜共患病科学家彼得·本·恩巴雷克（Peter Ben Embarek）领导的传染病专家仍在等待签证前往中国。     

报告显示，埃巴雷克于7月份对该国进行了一次出击，并说服北京向世卫组织人员敞开大门，进行预后调查。

 

中国外交部发言人华春莹周二在回应媒体提问时说，她“对世卫组织医疗队的行程和行程没有任何新信息”。

相反，华重申了外交部长王毅首先提出的北京最新路线，即“全球范围内的更多迹象和研究”表明，Covid-19可能具有“多种来源”，并且自第二次爆发以来，该流行病自从2019的上半年已在全球“多个地点”爆发。 

华说，相关调查显示，病原体的出现比以前想象的要早得多。她还希望其他国家可以与世界卫生组织“共同努力”，将Covid-19追溯到其来源。

“我们希望科学家们能够秉承专业精神和真理，在全球范围内找到[Covid-19]的起源，其他国家也可以像我们从第一天开始所做的那样与[WHO]合作和协助，” Hua说道。

 

尽管确实有2020年世卫组织的几名官员和专家（如Embarek）获准进入中国，但武汉却没有在被批准的行程当中。

目前尚不清楚，这次世卫组织专家小组行程的耽误是否反映了北京方面的政策变化。

 

去年12月，国营的民族主义《环球时报》透露，世卫组织的“前进小组”可能会在一月份前往武汉检查该市野生动物的湿市场，据信这可能是该病毒的起源。

该报还援引世界卫生组织官员的话说，来自日本，卡塔尔，丹麦，俄罗斯和其他国家的所有小组成员将首先在北京隔离14天。它补充说，世卫组织进行的“公开，公正”调查将有助于揭穿一些美国政客，尤其是即将卸任的美国总统唐纳德·特朗普所散布的“有关'中国病毒'的虚假新闻和阴谋论”。

该报的姐妹说：“自2019年底至2020年1月，武汉是第一个通过北京向世卫组织通报该病毒和疫情的城市，但这并不一定意味着武汉是疫源。”共产党最高喉舌《人民日报》的出版。

 

上海市疾病预防控制中心的消息人士告诉《亚洲时报》，这次旅行推迟的一个可能原因可能是自新年以来该病毒在河北省的爆发。

他说，国家卫生委员会已将一大批顶尖病毒学家派到北部省份，以追踪隐藏的病例，并遏制任何可能影响北京的外溢。这些专家中的一些最初计划与世卫组织同行在中国旅行期间一起，包括前往武汉。自周二以来，河北已报告34例局部感染。

消息人士说：“随着病例在北京附近再次爆发，国家卫生部门必须尽快作出反应，显然，世卫组织的检查工作已经不再是中国目前的首要关键事物。”

报告表明，一位世卫组织专家决定取消其航班，返回日内瓦的世卫组织总部，因为担心他在中国着陆后可能会被困在在机场。

据报道，另一名专家现在被困在过境县，显然正在等待有关该队签证的消息。

同时，中国和西方官员继续交换与Covid有关的指控和指责。

美国总统特朗普在新年演讲中再次使用“中国病毒”一词。在中国，新华社资深编辑的新叙事也在社交媒体上进行。

在此之前，华外交部的华同事赵立建对美国军方提出了严厉的指控，声称美国才是首次把病毒带到武汉。