Americans want to know why “China Virus” label is being used by political leaders

Some Americans are disturbed that politicians are calling COVID-19 the “China Virus.”

Shortly after the outbreak of COVID-19, President Trump, along with other political leaders in the U.S., started referring to the infectious disease as the “China Virus.” Trump defended this label in a press conference stating that this was an accurate name, since the disease originated in China. 

“I would ask them why they’re using that rhetoric. I watched the press conference where Trump said it comes from China,” said University of Arkansas student Elijah Conley. “Why use that term when medical professionals on a daily basis are calling it by its medical term?”

The use of this phrase has led to controversy and criticism while angering Chinese officials and resulting in xenophobia which has been reported in Asian-American communities.

“I think Trump’s use of the term was ill-advised without properly understanding the repercussions of how it would affect the Asian-immigrant and Asian-American communities in the U.S.,” said David Kyei Ko, a teacher who immigrated from South Korea, in an email interview. 

Ko said that the reason why this term doesn’t just affect Chinese-Americans or Chinese immigrants is because, based on his experience, Americans tend to think of all Asian people as Chinese people.

He worried from the moment Trump started using this term, that it would evoke anger and racism against the Asian community, he said.

One explanation for the phrasing may have been revealed in a Republican memo shared with news outlet Politico.             

The 57-page document counseled GOP candidates to attack China, when asked about COVID-19 on the campaign trail instead of offering an explicit defense of Trump’s response, according to Politico.  

Conley said he noticed the term being used on Twitter by Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, who has been mentioned as a future presidential contender.

“At first it caught me off guard because I follow a lot of political officials, both Democrat and Republican, and he’s the only one I noticed that used it,” Conley said. 

He thinks this term is divisive to the public, and inappropriate especially during a crisis time, he said.

“I would just want to see what their point of view is,” Conley said about political leaders using this term. 

Ka Zeng, political science professor and director of the Asian Studies program at the University of Arkansas, speculated that using this term may be to deflect criticism of the way Trump’s administration has handled the outbreak. 

She is apprehensive about the impact the use of this term will have on international relations, Zeng said in an email interview. 

“The use of the term may increase tensions in U.S.-China relations, already strained by the trade war, at a time when the pandemic calls for greater international cooperation, in particular cooperation between the world’s two largest economies,” she said. 

In 2015, the World Health Organization updated their practices for naming infectious diseases in order to “minimize unnecessary negative effects on nations, economies and people,” according to a press release on the WHO website. 

The press release states that the use of names for infectious diseases, including geographic regions or people’s names, has negatively impacted communities and economic sectors by stigmatizing them. 

Still, many Americans are split on whether they agree or disagree with the use of this term by politicians, according to The Harris Poll, a market research and consulting group headquartered in Chicago and New York City. 

This poll, taken three different times between the end of March and beginning of April, showed an average of 53 percent of Americans agreeing with the use of this term while 47 percent of Americans disagreed.  

The poll also found that a majority of Americans hold the Chinese government responsible for the spread of the disease. 

Even so, many Americans aren’t satisfied with the reasoning given by politicians about why this term is being used. 

“As the virus knows no boundaries and no one is immune from it, it is important that political officials put aside their differences to defeat the virus. After all, we are all in this together,” Zeng said.