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A California man who self-quarantined after returning home from China amid the coronavirus outbreak said he is '100x more concerned' for his health in the US than he was in China
A California man who self-quarantined after returning home from China amid the coronavirus outbreak said he is '100x more concerned' for his health in the US than he was in China
Katie CanalesMar 5, 2020, 23:21 IST
JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty ImagesThe New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on February 3 at Wall Street in New York City.
A Bay Area resident visited Kunming in China's Yunnan province 979 miles southwest of Wuhan, where COVID-19 originated, on January 25 in the midst of the coronavirus disease outbreak.
He said he saw more safety precautions being taken in China than in the US, like more masks being worn and officials understanding the gravity of the situation.
Seeing how differently the Chinese and US governments each handled the virus convinced him that he feels safer in China than he does on American soil.
A 36-year-old US citizen from Cupertino, California, visited Kunming, China, almost 1,000 miles southwest of Wuhan, where the coronavirus disease originated, on January 25.
At the time that the Bay Area resident and UX designer - who requested to stay anonymous but whose identity was verified by Business Insider - visited, there were at least 217 confirmed cases of the coronavirus disease, known as COVID-19, in China.
And following his trip, from January 25 to February 2, he observed just how differently the governments of both countries dealt with the growing virus that has now infected 94,000 people and killed more than 3,200.
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He told Business Insider that he observed locals and Chinese officials understanding the potential severity of the growing virus and taking safety precautions. That contrasted heavily with his work colleagues' blase attitudes back in the US and a disorderly experience at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) upon his return from China on February 2.
In China, he told Business Insider, he noticed precautions being taken.
Cathay Pacific Airways flight attendants wore masks aboard, as did many Chinese residents. The man said locals likely remembered what it was like experiencing the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and knew how to prepare. Passengers went through full-body screenings via infrared thermometers at an airport in Kunming.
When a relative who was already sick with late-stage cancer died while the man was visiting, the body was taken away by people in hazmat suits as a precaution.
The Chinese government also had implemented an order to cremate the body of a loved one within 12 hours of their death in case the subject was infected with the virus, which the man said he and his family followed. A Wuhan family was described as having to do the same in a New York Times report on February 9.
But returning to the US was a different story.
He said "the alarm bells" sounded when he saw how the virus was being addressed at San Francisco International Airport.
"They literally had no idea what they were doing," he said. One airport official even admitted that since things had escalated so quickly, they were in disarray.
Passengers deboarded the plane, he said, and no one was recording temperatures. (One of the symptoms of the disease is a fever, though cases have also been found to be asymptomatic.)
He also said no one was wearing masks.
It took him hours to go through the immigration process, the temperature-taking, and the paperwork. The man said the paperwork that the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) gave him was handwritten and then photocopied.
Since neither he nor his family members exhibited any symptoms or felt sick, they weren't tested for the coronavirus disease. Those that had returned from China were taken from the immigration gate to a designated area to have their temperature taken.
They also had to wait in "the little black room" in the airport, typically used for passengers with visa problems. Everyone that came from China was held there for a period of time, he said.
The Bay Area resident said immigration officials didn't wear any sort of protection, like masks, and they were impatient with people, telling them to stop asking questions when they inquired about the status of their wait time.
"It was really not a good experience at that point," he said.
If the resident Business Insider spoke to had returned from China's Hubei province, he would have been given a government-mandated quarantine.
But what he was given instead was a verbal recommendation to stay home and avoid going in public for 14 days. CDC officials also gave them info cards with guidelines on how to self-quarantine and told him, should he visit a primary care doctor, to give them the info card. Thousands in California and beyond are self-quarantining in response to the virus, regardless of if they are experiencing symptoms are not.
He said the CDC never contacted him during his quarantine to check in on his and his family's health, and there was no form or any kind of documentation to submit at the end of the quarantine.
"I'm seeing reports now that the CDC is monitoring, but what are they monitoring?" he said.
He worked from home, but his son went to school the day after the family returned to the US, despite the man's request to allow his son to stay home and for his absences to be excused. It was only after concerned parents learned of the son's trip to China that the school allowed the boy to stay home.
"If we had the virus, it would have already been out," the man said.
He completed his quarantine on Monday, February 17, but concerns over the virus are still looming as it spreads throughout the US. Based on his experience in both China and the US as the coronavirus has spread, he said his family is actually considering going back to China since they felt safer there.
"As someone who was in China during the initial outbreak/lockdowns and restrictions and seeing the situation develop here in the US I am 100x more concerned for my own safety during this crisis than I ever was in China," he told Business Insider in a message.
There are now 130 confirmed cases in the US across 16 states, including New York and Washington State. There are cases of "community spread" in the US, meaning patients are contracting the virus despite not traveling outside the US. And CDC test kits for the virus are limited.
"We're the richest country in the world," he said. "We should be the most prepared."
