View from other side, with love

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. If you were to look for a classic example of this dictum, look no further than China's efforts to control the spread of A(H1N1) virus. The authorities here reacted with remarkable alacrity as soon as the first cases were reported. And there has been no letup in the monitoring and quarantine ever since.

When SARS hit in 2003, China bore the brunt of it - not just in terms of casualties, but also in the flak it got for not being open with the extent of the spread here. Despite the initial bungling, let's not forget that a special hospital for SARS patients, fully equipped with state-of-the-art facilities came up in less than a month. But for the quick mobilization of men and materials, thanks to a much-maligned, "centralized" governance, this could never have happened. At the height of the SARS crisis, many people had a field day talking about hygiene issues in Chinese cities, the close sharing of living space between cattle and humans in the rural areas, and of course, civets cats. You know how it is out there, said the "experts". "Everything that walks, creeps or crawls ," wink, wink.

But this time around, despite the WHO raising its pandemic alert and as many as 74 nations across the world reporting HINI victims, the very same pundits have another grouse.

It's a waste of resources, they pontificate, referring to the quarantine measures. " The virus is actually weakening, there is no need for such panic", they say presciently. Ahem! The virus is weakening, presumably because it first hit the West?

Never mind the fact that the WHO has expressed fears of mutations that may show ever more resistance to the antidotes that, incidentally, are yet to moves from the labs to the market. And even when that happens, one doesn't have to be a rocket scientist to know which countries will rush to hog the vaccines first.

But such attitudes are nothing new. When countries like India were grappling with terrorists issues, it was always "the problem out there". What can a country torn apart by religious riots right after attaining independence expect, said the pundits then.

Oh, Hindus and Muslim can never live together, they said, with nary a thought for the fact that they did for hundreds of years and continue to do so, yes, even today despite scandalous occurrences like the Mumbai attacks. No one then was interested in knowing or understanding the basis of such conflicts.

But come 9/11, and the whole equation changed. Even as law-enforcement tightened anti-terrorism measures, CNN put out special programs, Inside the Middle East.

Post 9/11, which airline passenger has not felt frustrated by the endless checks at immigrations counters. You could be taking a flight that lasts just one hour from one US city to another, but spend a good half hour completing the security checks - taking off your watch, your shoes, belt pouch, camera (keep the bag separately, please), laptop (again, take it out of the bag, please) and heaven help if the body check sets off a beep triggered by something as innocuous as a piece of jewelry. But does anyone complain? No. It is for our collective safety and it makes sense.

And so it is with China's anti-H1N1 flu measures. It makes perfect sense.

As someone living here, I feel reassured that my children can go to school, to malls to the cinemas or just hang out in any crowded corner of this sprawling city without my dissolving into panic that they are going to return home with a potentially fatal flu. Yes, the measures are not fool proof but let me share with you a true story.

Last summer I went on a month-long trip to the US and Europe, passing through some of the strictest security measures anywhere and that included the airport in New York and Frankfurt.

While packing my big handbag, I had failed to notice that in its deep recesses lay a small leather manicure set, complete with clipper and scissors. This little set made it past every single security scanner and I noticed it only when I returned to Beijing and emptied my bag of all its contents. Hah!

(China Daily 08/06/2009 page9)