Society

The story of our South African returnees from Wuhan should give us encouragement and hope in the difficult weeks that lie ahead.

Dear Fellow South Africans,

As we begin the first full week of the nationwide lockdown to combat the coronavirus pandemic that is devastating the world, we are grateful for good news that brings us joy and hope at this difficult and uncertain time.

The construction site at Jiedaokou Station of the 2nd stage of Wuhan Subway Line 8 March 22, 2020.

One night in late January, Canadian Jacob Cooke found himself in Jiangsu province in China, desperately trying to find seats on a plane leaving the country and promising his brother, Joseph, he’d make it to Vancouver.

For more than a decade, they had run a business called WPIC Marketing + Technologies with an ocean between them, helping brands from Canada and, eventually, all over the globe launch e-commerce operations in China.

After scuttling its partnership with Beijing on public health, the U.S. was unprepared for the pandemic.

The lesson of COVID-19, influential politicians and commentators are claiming, is that the United States must delink itself from China. “China unleashed this plague on the world,” Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas recently told Sean Hannity, “and China has to be held accountable.” Cotton, who has proposed legislation to ban Americans from buying Chinese pharmaceuticals, isn’t alone. Representative Jim Banks of Indiana has urged Donald Trump to boost tariffs on Chinese products and put the money—which he incorrectly thinks would come from Chinese exporters rather than American importers—into a fund for Americans hurt by the coronavirus. In a recent essay in The American Interest, the political scientist Andrew Michta used the virus to demand a “hard decoupling” from China. Citing that essay approvingly, my Atlantic colleague Shadi Hamid recently argued, “After the crisis, whenever after is, the relationship with China cannot and should not go back to normal.”

In late January, Shari Rosen traveled from her home in Shanghai, China to California for a one week trip to celebrate the birthdays of her children. She is leaving behind a country in the midst of the coronavirus epidemic. That one week turned into six as the coronavirus emerged on the West Coast of the United States and travel restrictions made it impossible to quickly return to Shanghai. Instead, She waited it out in Los Angeles working to find a way to return to her 17-year-old business that provides services for children with disabilities in Shanghai.