On February 17 a number of people in China's Jinlin province were hospitalized due to Carbon Monoxide (CO, clever huh?) poisoning. Authorities claim atmospheric pressures may have triggered the incident.
China's pollution problems are no news to anyone, the same explosion in industry that has steered the country into its 'intimidating' economic status has also lowered the living standards of many civilians, not to mention more often than not, endangering their health outright.
This recent mass-poisoning is a prime example of what I feel to be one of the most significant setbacks facing China at present. Similar to their communist cousins before them, China is obsessed with showing the world its good side. Shangai boasts the world's largest TV tower and world's fastest train, their economy takes no second thought in flexing its influence upon the world, and Chinese officials often take a sort of joy in the fact that they are now encroaching upon US investment.
Everyone marvels at China, students with dollar signs in their eyes are signing up to learn Chinese. I enrolled in a class to better understand their political system; however, despite all of these so-called advances, China is in the dark ages in some of the more remote regions, and most of even Hong Kong's water supply is risky to drink! Annually Chinafaces floods (often a result of their governments own ambition paired with faulty engineering), environmental conflict, disease (two years ago: "what bird flu?!"), and pollution-based health incidents.
This is NOT a standard for the future economic powerhouse and until the government can get off of the old soviet bandwagon of denial and meaningless endorsement of SYMBOLS of power, prestige, and dominance there should be at least some criticism by the international community in order to sway China into a way of thinking based upon the greater good.
http://english.cctv.com/english/20060217/101785.shtml
1 Comments:
This reminds me of a documentary I watched about North Korea for another class. The reporters who were working on the doc. went to Pyongyang and reported that the city looked really nice, but it was like a ghost town; there were hardly any people there at all. It's all just a facade. Few people really knew how bad conditions were in Russia until the Soviet Union fell and it was opened up for the world to see. Communist countries are constantly trying to hide their citizens and the world from the reality of their situations, because when it comes down to it, the system just doesn't work.
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