Corona scare, ignorance are fuelling social tensions

Corona scare, ignorance are fuelling social tensions

Global anxiety about the spread of the novel coronavirus has fuelled racial tensions, prompting the United Nations human rights chief Michelle Bachelet on Thursday to urge the world to tackle the “disturbing wave of prejudice” against people of Chinese and East Asian ethnicity. In India as well, the virus spawned fear has stoked xenophobic sentiments. Earlier this month, a student of Delhi University’s Kirori Mal College who hails from the Northeast complained to college authorities that she was called ‘coronavirus’ on campus by a group of students. The principal, Vibha Singh Chauhan, said the college would soon hold a sensitisation programme for students. In Mumbai, a resident of a housing society shot and circulated a video of a woman from Nagaland, suspecting her to be Chinese. The 23-year-old woman had arrived from Kohima to visit a friend — a tenant in the society — on February 10 when another resident shot a video of her and again sent it to the landlord. The friend hosting the woman, a 23-year-old from Nagaland studying at Tata Institute of Social Sciences(TISS), said, “I was shocked to see the video where my friend was being filmed by my neighbour. His wife even asked my friend to leave the building.”

 Fear of and ignorance about coronavirus is increasingly resulting in anyone with East Asian features or people from China and its neighbourhood becoming targets of racist slurs and discrimination — in campuses, hotels, and malls. NEWS IN BRIEF EXPLORE BRIEFS Coronavirus spread puts densely populated India on high alert As the novel coronavirus spreads from China around the globe, India appears especially at risk because of its dense population, patchy health-care system and high rate of migration. The nation has confirmed just three cases, while the Indian government says 23,531 people are under observation. 'US spy agencies monitor corona spread, concerns about India' US intelligence agencies are monitoring the global spread of coronavirus and the ability of governments to respond. While there are only a few known cases in India, the country's available countermeasures and the potential for the virus to spread given India's dense population was a focus of serious concern, sources said. About the time Lui (name changed), a 27-year-old Chinese man, reached Kerala for the last leg of his solo expedition across Southeast Asia, the severity of an unassuming flu-like illness reported from a sea market in China had become apparent. By February 4, thousands of cases of the novel coronavirus had come to light, unleashing along with anxiety a barrage of anti-Asian prejudices and sinophobic incidents across the globe. And Lui — who hails from Sichuan province and had reached Thiruvananthapuram after covering Sri Lanka, Delhi and Bengaluru — was about to find firsthand just how bad things were. All the hotels Lui went to, including government-run guest houses, denied him accommodation because he was Chinese. 

When he approached the city police commissioner for help, he was taken to the isolation ward of a hospital though he did not have any symptoms. For two weeks, the hospital was Lui’s home. Later, tests cleared him of infection and yet no hotel was ready to take him in. As the infection has spread so has the hostility towards “Chinese-looking people”. While a man in the US was caught telling someone “you dropped your corona”, several people in France have spoken about the prejudice they faced under the hashtag #JeNeSuisPasUn-Virus (#IAmNotAVirus). Now it’s come to India.


 - Times of India