3. President Xi Jinping traveled to Russia this week to meet with Vladimir Putin. Economic relations between the two countries have weakened in recent years. (Wall Street Journal $)
4. A year after the China Eastern Airlines crash that killed 132 people, the Chinese government still has no idea what happened. (Associated Press)
5. Jiang Yanyong, the Chinese doctor who uncovered the SARS epidemic in 2003, has died at the age of 91. (NPR)
6. Someone keeps cutting the submarine cables that connect the islands of Taiwan to the Internet. Taiwanese officials blamed accidental damage on Chinese ships. (deputy)
7. Guo Wengi, the controversial Chinese billionaire with close ties to Steve Bannon, was arrested in New York on Wednesday in connection with a $1 billion fraud scheme. (NBC News)
- Launched in 2020, Guo and Bannon’s “New Federal State of China” in 2022 greatly exaggerated its role in rescuing Ukrainian refugees and used it for political propaganda. (Mother Jones)
Lost in translation
In the first two years of the outbreak, Chinese insurance companies popularized “Covid insurance”: people could pay a one-time premium of a few dollars and get thousands of dollars back if they contracted Covid. But as journalist Yu Meng writes in the Chinese publication Connecting, that payment may be harder to come by.
U. He bought Covid insurance in early 2022 and tested positive in a home antigen test in December, after China opened outbreak control measures during a national wave of infections. The insurance company gave her a phone number to call, but no one answered. Yu reports that there are at least 60,000 more people who have filed claims against the same company. Some call dozens of times a day, and some sue the company. Some have filed complaints with China’s insurance regulator. But in the end very few people were actually paid.
At one point, when she was finally able to reach the company, customer representative Yu said, “Do you know how many claims we have? Do you think the people above me haven’t calculated the cost? Of course they did. It can reach billions and make the company bankrupt. Do you think the government will allow a state company to go bankrupt? Can you imagine this? ” In the end, Yu, who expected to earn 20,000 RMB ($2,900), received 5000 RMB. Her parents, who bought the same insurance, waived any refund.
One more thing
Even kids can’t escape the AI craze now. Recently, a local government in China’s eastern province of Zhejiang announced that it will include more artificial intelligence education in the classroom and middle school curriculum. It’s still unclear how strong the lessons will be, but I’m wondering: Will we come full circle and see Chinese kids doing their homework on Ernie the Bot?
