Interview: Associating virus to any race, ethnic group unfortunate, says Pakistani specialist-Xinhua

Interview: Associating virus to any race, ethnic group unfortunate, says Pakistani specialist

Source: Xinhua

Editor: huaxia

2020-03-15 08:50:10

ISLAMABAD, March 15 (Xinhua) -- A disease does not have any border or belong to a certain nation, and associating it with any country, race or ethnic group is very unfortunate, Pakistani public health specialist Shimail Daud Arain told Xinhua in a recent interview.

"Such disease like coronavirus has resulted into epidemics, and now pandemic. The only way to really overcome such a challenge is to work together hand in hand," Arain said in an interview with Xinhua on Friday, in reference to racist propaganda by some mainstream factions of western community against Chinese and Asians.

"An attempt by any head of state or any nation, in trying to demonize or create this understanding amongst the global citizens of this world that any disease is specific to an ethnicity or any region is definitely very despicable," he said while responding to the racist remarks by some U.S. senior officials including vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Arain said recently a lot of experts are sharing their findings of the genomic or structure of the viruses which they found to have more than one.

"A lot of questions need to be answered. In some of the countries where the spread is being transmitted, some of the patients have not even traveled internationally. They are locally placed, they did not have any contact with anyone but sometimes it has been seen that they were tested and they were found to have positive coronavirus."

He is of the view that these findings must lead scientists and experts to research in-depth to explore why certain discoveries signify the fact that this virus might have been in circulation even before getting identified and diagnosed in China's central province.

Daud believes that experts all over the world should collectively try towards resolving this crisis as they are impartial to the political biases, adding that utilizing Chinese experience in this regard would be extremely beneficial since the country's successful countering strategy has been acknowledged by the World Health Organization.