China expert and author Gordon Chang told Newsmax Friday that the United States should impose travel restrictions from China until we know more about the source of the outbreak in pneumonia cases there.
Chang told "Carl Higbie FRONTLINE," hosted by Lidia Curanaj, that the China Communist Party lied early and often about the COVID-19 outbreak and that the country "has a very bad reputation for truth."
Retired Adm. Brett Giroir, a pediatrician and former U.S. assistant secretary for health, joined Chang for the interview and said these are serious viruses affecting children in the U.S., just not new ones.
But Chang's argument centered on information coming out of China that known germs — not "novel pathogens" — are behind the catastrophic conditions there.
Chang said we need to make sure we can verify that first.
"I don't believe the CCP," Chang told Curanaj. "Gotta remember that in December 2019 and January 2020, they told the world — including the United States — that [COVID-19] was not highly transmissible human to human, so not to worry. And, of course, they knew because they were seeing what was occurring in Wuhan and surrounding areas."
"So China has a very bad reputation for truth. We know that they've lied continually. And so I believe, yes, we should be preventing any travel from China from anyone who's coming from China — anyone who's been there for the last two weeks," Chang added. "People will say that's drastic. But if we had done this in December 2019, we would not have suffered the 1.1 million Americans who perished from this disease, according to Johns Hopkins.
"Even if that number is high, as some people think, you know more than zero is completely unacceptable.
"So I believe we need strict measures until we know for sure, not just guessing," Chang said.
Giroir added that viruses in China are having a catastrophic affect on children there because of the post-COVID-19 lockdowns that didn't allow children to work their immune systems back up to fight off viruses.
"Brett is probably right," Chang said. "But the point is, we're still relying on information from a regime that lied last time and with the result, more than 7 million people around the world but died from [COVID-19]."
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Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
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