Letters | Why Hong Kong believers in ‘Wuhan virus’ are shooting themselves in the foot

March 2020 will remain an unforgettable month in human history, underlined by the World Health Organization’s formal designation of the outbreaks of Covid-19 as a “pandemic”.

In its early days, then US president Donald Trump repeatedly used the term “Chinese virus” while “Wuhan virus” was adopted by right-wing media establishments in the United States and by a significant proportion of people here in Hong Kong. Yes, Wuhan was where the outbreak was first reported. And yes, the Chinese Communist Party failed miserably in the handling of information which, to a certain degree, has had a tremendous impact across the world, especially on those living in underdeveloped communities.

Nevertheless, that is no reason to refer to the virus with such racist undertones, as pandemic-induced hate has already caused immense suffering to ethnic Chinese communities in the West. For those who specifically refer to themselves as Hongkongers, perhaps as a way of distinguishing themselves from their compatriots on the mainland, I am here to tell you the truth: you are identified by the colour of your skin.

I am a Chinese-Canadian who migrated to Toronto before moving back to Hong Kong, and I have had first-hand experience of this. My family owns a Chinese restaurant in the suburbs of Toronto and our volumes dropped significantly in February 2020, during the time of the Lunar New Year, when Wuhan was placed under a strict lockdown, even though community transmission was virtually non-existent in the Greater Toronto Area. In normal times, we would have the highest number of guests during the New Year festival. However, non-ethnic-Chinese patrons last year generally avoided all Chinese restaurants in the area.