People attend a vigil to mourn Dr. Li Wenliang on February 7, 2020 in Hong Kong. (Anthony Kwan/Getty Images)

When Dr. Li Wenliang passed away on Thursday, a victim of the virus that he was instrumental in identifying, Chinese authorities concealed his death. The CCP initially sought to remove all mentions of his death from China's internet, sparking an uproar as social media users across China saw their comments and free speech censored in real time.

Dr. Li’s life – and tragic death – reveal how the unintended effects of the coronavirus can be as consequential as the virus itself. 

This week, Hudson experts looked at the potential impact of the coronavirus on the US healthcare industry, financial markets, and global adoption of technology connected to China's censorship practices. Read their perspectives below, and watch our event next week exploring how the US can respond to the crisis.

Unintended Consequences

Hudson experts examine the second-order effects of the coronovirus outbreak. 

Walter Russell Mead on the push to "de-Sinicize" markets in his Wall Street Journal column:

The most important longer-term outcome would appear to be a strengthening of a trend for global companies to “de-Sinicize” their supply chains. Add the continuing public health worries to the threat of new trade wars, and supply-chain diversification begins to look prudent.

Given the accumulated costs of decades of state-driven lending, massive malfeasance by local officials in cahoots with local banks, a towering property bubble, and vast industrial overcapacity, China is as ripe as a country can be for a massive economic correction. 

Many now fear the coronavirus will become a global pandemic. The consequences of a Chinese economic meltdown would travel with the same sweeping inexorability. Commodity prices around the world would slump, supply chains would break down, and few financial institutions anywhere could escape the knock-on consequences. Recovery in China and elsewhere could be slow, and the social and political effects could be dramatic.

Tim Morrison on America's vulnerable medical supply chain in NBC News:

Everything from antibiotics to chemotherapy drugs, from antidepressants to Alzheimer’s medications to treatments for HIV/AIDS, are frequently produced by Chinese manufacturers. What’s more, the most effective breathing masks and the bulk of other personal protective equipment — key to containing the spread of coronavirus and protecting health care workers — and even the basic syringe are largely made in China. The basic building blocks of U.S. health care are now under Xi’s control.

When it comes to the ravages of coronavirus, there could be significant consequences to the U.S. irrespective of the disease and contagion. With China facing devastation from the virus and taking emergency measures to contain and deal with the illness, it is becoming increasingly isolated from the rest of the world. Normal day-to-day supply chains are being disrupted if not cut off, posing a risk to the flow of medicine and protective gear the U.S. needs. Coronavirus is a painful wake-up call to the United States to begin to reclaim the control of our medical supply chain.

Thomas Duesterberg in The Wall Street Journal on the risks of CCP-funded telecom tech:

Huawei has been accused by U.S. congressional investigators of appropriating technology by questionable means. For instance, Huawei admitted in 2003 to copying code from Cisco for its router software.

China has also poured as much as $75 billion in subsidies into Huawei, the Journal reported. The company can now mount workable 5G systems and provide cheap or no-cost financing, construction and maintenance. That’s an attractive offer for many countries. The Huawei systems are proprietary, however, and require hardware and software from the Chinese parent to maintain or upgrade services. Countries that install Huawei systems often find themselves strategically dependent on the company and, therefore, China.

​The U.S. argues that the security of the Chinese systems is hopelessly compromised by the ease of capturing users’ data and the companies’ legal requirement to share it with Chinese authorities when requested. 

Quotes have been edited for length and clarity

Go Deeper: Hudson on the Coronavirus

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