‘Despicable Practice’: China, And Critics, Reject Calling COVID-19 The ‘Wuhan Virus’

Topline: Chinese officials are pushing back on people calling the COVID-19 coronavirus the “Wuhan virus,” which they and other critics say is a racist and xenophobic term, as a debate ignites around referring to the disease that’s impacted the world’s markets, business and travel, while sickening over 114,000 people.

• Secretary of State Mike Pompeo used the term in media appearances last week, which China’s foreign ministry called on Monday a “despicable practice” and will “stigmatize” the country, according to CNBC.
• Rep. Paul A. Gozar (R-AZ), one of at least seven members of Congress self-quarantining after coming into contact with a coronavirus-infected person at the CPAC conference, used the term on Twitter, triggering an avalanche of criticism.
• The World Health Organization specifically chose the name “COVID-19” for this coronavirus in order to not stigmatize an ethnicity, country or animal, according to director-general Tedros Ghebreyesus on February 11, the day the group announced the name.
• Pompeo used the term in disagreement with China’s foreign ministry, which suggested the virus may not have originated there, the New York Times reported Tuesday, citing an unnamed State Department official⁠.
• The Times also reported that Pompeo accused China of withholding information, which Foreign Ministry spokesperson said his “attempts of slandering China’s efforts in combating the epidemic is doomed to fail.”
• Many media outlets did refer to the coronavirus as the “Wuhan virus” before WHO officially named it, which defenders of using the controversial term have pointed out, according to the Washington Post.

Crucial quote: “This is the consequence they didn’t want by calling it the ‘Wuhan Virus,’” Yale professor emeritus of history and history of medicine Frank Snowden told the New York Times. “….I imagine that people that are still calling it that are using it in a very loaded, ethnic way, and I believe it’s mainly associated with people on the political right. That shows exactly the wisdom of trying to refer to something scientific and factual.”

Key background: There’s a long history of associating diseases with the locations where they were discovered, according to the Post. Ebola, Zika and Lyme all received their names in this manner. Experts say, however, that these kinds of naming conventions can not only wreak havoc on economies but also unfairly discriminate people based on ethnicity. It took WHO multiple weeks to name the coronavirus COVID-19, but had previously advised using “2019-nCoV” as a temporary solution.

Tangent: WHO has advised against naming diseases after places since 2015.