foreignpolicy--2020-06-29--How Canadian Bureaucracy Botched a Critical Ebola Treatment

Some labs have been preparing for years .
At the world ’ s most secure facilities—Level 4 laboratories like the Canadian lab in Winnipeg—pandemic preparedness has long been a key part of their work .
There ’ s reason to be optimistic .
The Winnipeg lab has been on the cutting edge of infectious disease before .
At that lab a decade ago , one brilliant researcher came up with a new strategy to fight the Ebola virus .
It was a medical breakthrough that , based on some cases , brought infected patients back from death ’ s door @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , could unlock the secret to beating COVID-19—and other viruses including HIV .
Canada was in a unique position to stop what was , at that point , one of the worst epidemics in modern times—before bureaucracy and government stinginess got in the way .
Back then , plans were drawn up and budgets written to treat 5,000 patients in Ebola-stricken West Africa , and that was just the beginning .
With some luck , Canada could help save tens of thousands more .
And it could have the knock-on effect of breathing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ prepare for the next epidemic .
But the plans fell apart .
As shown in hundreds of pages of government documents obtained through Freedom of Information requests , the machinery of government crushed those well-intentioned plans .
Interviews with those involved explain how bureaucratic infighting , tight budgets , and a partnership with a private tobacco company all contributed to Canada ’ s inability to get this life-saving treatment to those who needed it .
The genius researcher who pioneered the treatment would go on to focus on other things , including strains @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was led out of the lab , escorted by the federal police as part of a secretive investigation about which the government remains mum .
She is now the unfortunate target of international conspiracy theories .
As the world puts its shoulder to the wheel in search of a cure for COVID-19 , the story of how Canada failed to fight Ebola serves as a cautionary tale as to what can go wrong .
Qiu spent years designing a cure for a virus that , by and large , hadn ’ t been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ began investigating a therapy , whereby she would flood the patient ’ s system with antibodies .
Even if it sounds simple , that solution was not intuitive .
Antibodies are Y-shaped proteins that are produced naturally by the body—they work by latching on to invading viruses and bacteria , flagging them for the white blood cells to attack .
But what makes Ebola so deadly is its ability to kill those white blood cells , kneecapping the immune system ’ s response .
Other researchers were far from convinced : If the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ effectively , what good were the antibodies ?
“ The conclusion was mainly that antibodies would never work against Ebola , ” said Gary Kobinger , one of Canada ’ s most celebrated infectious disease experts who served as the chief of special pathogens for the lab until 2015 .
In an interview with Foreign Policy , he recalled that Qiu “ kept pushing.
” Around that time , Canada ’ s then-Conservative Party government reduced the lab ’ s core funding by about a third .
“ I had to stop a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ice because we just didn ’ t have money , ” Kobinger said .
In clinical trials on various animals , ZMAb showed remarkable promise .
In the post-9/11 world , governments around the world had found themselves woefully unprepared for the possibility of an easy-to-carry-out chemical or biological attack .
Labs worldwide were researching how to prevent outbreaks and stop the spread of deadly viruses .
In America , defense dollars flowed fast .
The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority was set up to help fund the research and development of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be used in bioterrorism .
At the end of the R & D process , there was the promise that the Pentagon might buy huge quantities of the treatment or vaccine for its national stockpile .
It meant that labs could pioneer cures that might not have any short-term commercial application , but thanks to their clear nexus to national security , could still come out with a profit .
In Canada , researchers weren ’ t quite as lucky .
Ottawa is significantly less liberal with its research funding than Washington , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of government contracts for innovative firms .
Especially at that time , under a tight-fisted conservative government , there was a tremendous push to develop medical advances that could be commercialized and offloaded from the government quickly .
Qiu learned that well .
“ I sat down with Qiu and said , ‘ Listen , I might be the only one , but I believe in your antibodies , ’ ” Kobinger told Foreign Policy .
So the lab trials continued .
Qiu was right .
Her research showed that if enough of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ glob on to and weigh down the virus , even blocking it from entering healthy cells .
That gave the white blood cells a fighting chance to take down the invaders .
It ’ s like an exploding dye pack in a bag of stolen money—not only does it identify a bank robber , but it may actually slow their getaway .
Economic necessity became the mother of new invention at the lab .
While there was a long list of different antibodies that could be used as a therapy , Kobinger pushed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ effective ones for future research .
They called the result ZMAb—short for the three EBOV-GP-specific monoclonal antibodies—and they patented the treatment in 2009 , uploading the details of the cure on publicly available American and Canadian patent databases .
In clinical trials on various animals , ZMAb showed remarkable promise .
In one study , published in the journal Nature , the lab announced that taking the three antibodies would lead to “ complete survival when administered at 24 hours post-infection ” and would still be effective at fighting the virus as late @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But , as there had been no major outbreaks of Ebola in years — to that point , there had been only small outbreaks in West Africa , killing about 300 people a year — clinical trials in humans weren ’ t an option .
ZMAb would sit on a shelf .
Just in case .
At the Public Health Agency of Canada ( PHAC ) , officials were eager to confront the emerging outbreak .
“ There is rapidly increasing high level interest in all matters pertaining to Ebola situation , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in an email obtained under Canada ’ s freedom of information laws .
In the years since Kobinger and Qiu patented their Ebola treatment a year after discovery , Canada had actually sold the licensing rights to ZMAb to Toronto biodefense company Defyrus , which wasn ’ t uncommon .
The lab had limited capacity to bring ZMAb to market , so it made sense to open its development to the private sector .
If an outbreak occurred and an emergency was declared , however , Canada always had the right to produce @ @ @ @ @ @ @ compassionate use , ” basis .
The nuts and bolts of Qiu ’ s innovative treatment were readily available online—the lab had published papers about ZMAb ’ s promise .
In the early days of the 2014 outbreak , PHAC got a phone call from California-based Mapp Biopharmaceutical .
The company had come up with its own antibody cocktail and wanted to collaborate .
It had , in fact , already struck a sublicensing deal with Defyrus .
The Winnipeg lab saw no problem with that .
In a way , both sides @ @ @ @ @ @ @ For me , it ’ s not about my antibody , your antibody , I don ’ t care—what I want is the best treatment , ” Kobinger said .
It helped that Mapp Bio had significant grants from the U.S. government .
The National Microbiology Laboratory tested Mapp Bio ’ s treatment and found that one of its antibodies worked better than one of Qiu ’ s .
The lab mixed the two Canadian antibodies with the one discovered in America and called the result ZMapp .
Getting private industry and government @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been the hard part .
But with the crisis in full flow , everyone at the table seemed keen to get started .
“ PHAC came with all their big enthusiasm , ” Kobinger recalled , “ and said , ‘ We need to make this in Canada .
And we need to use this as a way to build capacity in Canada.
’ ” But Canada had little ability to mass-produce antibodies like the ones needed for ZMapp .
To make ZMapp , they would need a cell line—a culture , usually @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , that would be used to replicate the antibodies in large quantities .
Chinese hamsters have been the foundation of molecular biology for most of the past century .
Researchers discovered around 1919 that they reproduce quickly ; their immune system is very receptive to foreign pathogens and parasites ; and they have relatively few chromosomes , making their genetics easier to understand .
The only real downside is that they resist breeding in captivity .
By the late 1950s , scientists discovered that an ovary cell from a female hamster could be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could be used to replicate a chosen protein .
In these rows of hamster cells , scientists had essentially created tiny biological factories .
Cell lines .
The promise was endless .
So much so that H.C. Hu , a Chinese researcher , smuggled out a small crate of hamsters as Mao Zedong ’ s forces approached Peking .
He handed off the tiny rodents to Robert Briggs Watson , an American researcher studying a cure for malaria .
But even from those noble beginnings , there were fears that these cells could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Watson and H.C. Hu smuggled the rodents out of China to New York , they were accused by a germ warfare commission set up by the People ’ s Republic of China of war crimes and plotting a biological attack , resulting in H.C. Hu being sent to a “ reeducation ” detention camp .
While the wild accusations were part of the Maoist paranoia of the 1950s in China , the cell lines that were created from this ground-breaking research could be used to replicate the pathogens just as much as they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , there is really only one Chinese hamster ovary cell line available , and it belongs to the National Research Council ( NRC ) , a government agency with a mandate to “ take research impacts from the lab to the marketplace.
” “ So who got involved ?
” Kobinger said .
“ NRC.
” While the NRC downplayed its involvement in the production of ZMapp , those involved say the agency was hungry to pass off this project to the better-financed Americans .
It should have been straight-forward : PHAC had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ line .
Together , they should have been able to mass-produce the antibodies needed .
Instead , the bureaucratic wrangling began almost immediately .
In late September 2014 , NRC invoiced PHAC nearly $ 200,000 for its “ services ” —before any antibodies were even grown .
The NRC decided it was responsible for ZMapp and began running the show , Kobinger said .
“ They [ NRC ] were holding their cell line saying , no , you can ’ t have access to it.
” The NRC saw an opportunity to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dollars in grants available to whoever would be able to mass-produce it .
That money wouldn ’ t come from shipping the treatment to Africa , however .
Meanwhile , the U.S. Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority “ calls me and says , ‘ Gary , I don ’ t understand , there ’ s these people at NRC who are telling us that these antibodies are theirs , ” Kobinger recalled .
“ ‘ And we know they are developed by you .
What they are telling us is that we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ antibodies in [ Chinese hamster ovary ] cells and you ’ re going to pay for it.
’ ” Kobinger said he received a similar call from the Gates Foundation .
While the NRC , in emails to Foreign Policy , downplayed its involvement in the production of ZMapp , those involved say the agency was hungry to pass off this project to the better-financed Americans .
But there was a big problem with that .
Mapp Bio , much like the Winnipeg lab , focused on diseases “ where commercial markets are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Mapp Bio , told Foreign Policy .
His company relies on grants , he explained , and U.S. agencies look for one key thing : “ Innovation , ” he said .
Mapp Bio wanted to do away with using Chinese hamster ovary cells to grow the antibodies .
Plant cells , it hoped , would be faster and cheaper—specifically , tobacco plants .
The motivations weren ’ t hard to identify .
So Mapp Bio partnered with Kentucky BioProcessing , which had earlier that year been acquired by Reynolds American , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the world .
“ At the time , we were told , or there was evidence that , tobacco plants were actually faster and more effective , ” said Greg Taylor , who served as Canada ’ s chief medical officer and head of the PHAC from 2014 to 2016 .
“ That ’ s why we were interested.
” It was all hypothetical , however .
Zeitlin confirmed that Mapp Bio had never brought a product to market using tobacco cells .
While there is ample research on the promise of plant @ @ @ @ @ @ @ regulators had not approved any drugs or therapies grown in plant cells .
ZMapp would be their trial run .
The move was a public relations coup for the tobacco giant .
ZMapp was a case study as to “ How Big Tobacco and the Military Came Together , ” as NBC News heralded it on Aug. 5 , 2014 , without mentioning that the treatment had been developed in Canada .
One was to have Canada ask Mapp Bio to take over .
The second was for Ottawa to produce ZMAb itself @ @ @ @ @ @ @ government opted for the third option : to find domestic producers to make two of the antibodies in Chinese hamster ovary cells and have Mapp Bio produce the third in tobacco plant cells .
The cocktail would be combined in Canada and shipped to West Africa .
In nearly every case where the treatment was used , the patient survived .
The report concluded that despite the insistence from the Americans , tobacco plants would be “ slower than the industry standard ” and would not necessarily be more effective .
There was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t produce the antibodies , PHAC would find someone to do it in Canada .
The report requested $ 22 million to produce the Canadian antibodies , which would be enough to treat nearly 5,000 patients .
That would serve as ZMapp ’ s human trial .
The report envisioned a “ long-term , large-scale ” approach , recommending an additional $ 38 million be spent on a second round of production that could help treat up to 36,000 people .
Hiring Canadian firms to make two of the antibodies had the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ capital costs so they could mass-produce antibodies for other applications in the future ; there was already emerging interest that antibody therapy could treat a host of other infectious diseases .
The first doses would be delivered to the Ebola-afflicted regions by March 2015 .
As the bureaucratic cogs turned , PHAC was already receiving requests to treat health care workers who had contracted the virus in the field .
Documents show that throughout 2014 , Ottawa shipped more than a dozen doses of ZMapp and ZMAb throughout the United States , Europe @ @ @ @ @ @ @ doctors and nurses , and Mapp Bio shipped a dozen more .
In nearly every case where the treatment was used , the patient survived .
“ All the clinicians who called me said , ‘ We are convinced that your stuff has saved the lives of these patients , ’ ” Kobinger said .
Two medium-sized labs , one in Montreal and the other in Toronto , were tapped to produce the antibodies .
At least one of the labs viewed the contract as the first step toward scaling up to produce @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But the contracts weren ’ t for millions after all .
The NRC contracts were inexplicably just $ 325,000 each .
Then there was the third antibody .
The Americans never seemed to get the memo .
Speaking to Foreign Policy recently , Zeitlin said the plan was news to him .
“ I ’ m not sure what your information about just one antibody is referring to , ” he wrote in an email .
The NRC contracts weren ’ t for millions after all .
They were inexplicably just $ 325,000 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ small quantity of two antibodies .
But instead of forging ahead , it suddenly scuppered the plans , and no further contracts were issued to the companies .
An internal report lamented that “ significant investments required ” and “ limited financial incentives for the private sector ” had stymied the project .
Conversations kept happening anyway .
In November , both agencies had a call with Medicago , a Quebec City company , to discuss the “ business proposal ” for ZMapp .
Medicago , like Mapp Bio , wanted to grow @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of its company is owned by American cigarette giant Philip Morris .
That didn ’ t work , either .
PHAC denied to Foreign Policy that it ever discussed ZMapp with the company , contradicting its own internal documents .
By the start of 2015 , more than 8,000 were dead in West Africa .
In April 2015 , Ottawa inked a $ 3 million contract with Mapp Bio for ZMapp .
But the company had other orders to fill first , for the Pentagon , and it was pushed back .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2016—the same month the outbreak officially ended , leaving more than 11,000 dead behind .
A spokesperson for PHAC , citing security reasons , refused to confirm how many doses were delivered .
Mapp Bio confirmed that doses were provided to PHAC , but a nondisclosure agreement covers the contract .
“ We were so ahead on all fronts , ” Kobinger said , adding that it ’ s all “ an unfortunate series of events.
” ZMapp had another chance , in August 2018 , when a second outbreak began in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Bio quickly produced the necessary antibodies and sent ZMapp to the affected regions , where it was included in ongoing clinical trials .
Canada had no involvement in those trials .
Yet preliminary results , published in the New England Journal of Medicine , showed that just half of the patients who received ZMapp survived .
That ’ s a far cry from the high survival rates researchers had seen before .
Doctors who had been equipped with the tobacco plant-grown ZMapp found that patients ’ bodies didn ’ t take the plant-based @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Policy there are a few explanations for why ZMapp performed poorly .
The virus in the Democratic Republic of the Congo may not have been the same as the one from Guinea .
Or ZMapp may not have been as effective as researchers once hoped .
But a third theory points more blame .
“ Quicker infusion may be important for antibody treatments , ” Zeitlin said .
Qiu ’ s original idea behind the antibody therapy was to flood the patient ’ s system .
When the National Microbiology Laboratory sent doses @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the lab using Chinese hamster ovary cells , that ’ s how they were administered—quickly .
But doctors who had been equipped with the tobacco plant-grown ZMapp found that patients ’ bodies didn ’ t take the plant-based treatment as well .
It had to be administered more slowly , over four hours .
Mapp Bio appeared to recognize the problem even before the clinical results came in .
Zeitlin said the plan had been to abandon tobacco plants and move to the Chinese hamster ovary cell production .
But after ZMapp had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it was excluded from future trials .
The 2018 outbreak was officially declared over on June 25 .
It left more than 2,200 dead in the Democratic Republic of the Congo , primarily in the northeast .
A new outbreak , in the northwest , was declared in early June .
Mapp Bio pursued the strategy it did because the nature of private-sector research required it .
“ When you try and actually develop things from a proactive need , public-good perspective , it ’ s very difficult , ” said Taylor , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was no reason why Ottawa could not have gotten ZMapp out the door as originally planned , back in early 2015 , when it was needed most .
“ PHAC came out with good intentions and a good plan and good everything but got completely stalled and neutralized by the NRC , ” Kobinger said .
It was all because of “ a few people.
” Kobinger added : “ From the beginning , it was definitely a strategic mistake to have pushed so hard for tobacco plants.
” A spokesperson for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ push to establish a ‘ business case ’ to develop a plant-based production process for ZMAb.
” That ’ s directly contradicted by memos and emails from the NRC itself , which repeatedly cite the need to find a commercial justification for the treatment .
“ What needed to happen , which did not happen , is that somebody with a reasonable mind at a very high level , at the ministerial level maybe , needed to sit everyone down and say , ‘ You ’ re crazy .
This is happening .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ world , ’ ” Kobinger said .
Zeitlin said Mapp Bio is now pursuing a new treatment for Ebola and the similar Marburg virus .
Monoclonal antibody treatments are also showing promise in fighting HIV .
“ That is what I ’ m the most excited about , ” Kobinger said .
Two monoclonal antibody treatments in the Congo trials , which were developed after Qiu ’ s breakthrough , were shown to be effective .
( Both were administered quicker than ZMapp . )
The developer of one of those treatments , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ three-antibody cocktail to treat COVID-19 .
There is still a push to bring big tobacco into the lab , too .
In March , Kentucky BioProcessing and Reynolds American announced they are “ in the process of developing a vaccine candidate [ for COVID-19 ] that we hope to have available for testing within the next few weeks , ” said Kaelan Hollon , a spokesperson for Reynolds American .
British American Tobacco has made a similar announcement .
Kobinger left the Winnipeg lab in 2015 .
The bureaucratic infighting over ZMAb was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ He recalls telling Qiu at the time : “ If I want to stay ahead of this curve , a little bit , and I still have a chance to contribute , I need to leave and go into academia.
” Kobinger is now at Laval University ’ s Infectious Disease Research Centre in Quebec City .
Recently , he has partnered with Medicago to develop antibodies that could help fight COVID-19 .
Neither the Royal Canadian Mounted Police nor the federal government will explain what Qiu is alleged to have done .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ crime .
Qiu continued working at the National Microbiology Laboratory .
In 2017 , she penned a prescient article with a colleague lamenting the lack of funding to research vaccines for coronaviruses .
Given the cost and time it can take , she wrote , “ there is a lack of incentive from agencies to fund research into and develop vaccines against obscure pathogens that may or may not cause outbreaks in humans.
” Qiu ’ s work , however , was cut short .
In July 2019 , the Royal Canadian Mounted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ her off the premises .
Neither the RCMP nor the federal government will explain what Qiu is alleged to have done .
She has not been charged with a crime .
Qiu had been working with the Level 4 laboratory in Wuhan , China , in the years before her removal .
The Winnipeg Free Press reported that the RCMP investigation found that Qiu failed to follow protocols for how deadly viruses , including Ebola , were sent to colleagues in China .
Kobinger told Foreign Policy he believes Qiu followed all appropriate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in nature and overblown .
As COVID-19 began spreading in Wuhan , conspiracy theories percolated .
ZeroHedge , a pseudonymous blog known to peddle Russian disinformation , alleged that Qiu gave the coronavirus to the Wuhan lab , which was weaponized by Beijing .
These theories have been debunked .
Researchers say there is zero evidence the virus was made in a lab .
Qiu ’ s life work , Kobinger said , has been to help the world battle pandemics like this .
Canada could have produced the necessary antibodies , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It could have scaled up domestic capacity to produce lifesaving treatments for infectious diseases .
It could have treated its internationally renowned researchers better .
It failed across the board .
African victims of Ebola paid the price .
Will the handling of possible coronavirus vaccines be any better ?

In labs around the world, researchers are furiously working on ways to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic. Therapies to treat the symptoms, antivirals to combat the novel coronavirus itself, and ultimately vaccines to defend the public from the fast-spreading bug.
Some labs have been preparing for years. At the world’s most secure facilities—Level 4 laboratories like the Canadian lab in Winnipeg—pandemic preparedness has long been a key part of their work.
There’s reason to be optimistic. The Winnipeg lab has been on the cutting edge of infectious disease before. At that lab a decade ago, one brilliant researcher came up with a new strategy to fight the Ebola virus. It was a medical breakthrough that, based on some cases, brought infected patients back from death’s door. It is research that, today, could unlock the secret to beating COVID-19—and other viruses including HIV.
Canada was in a unique position to stop what was, at that point, one of the worst epidemics in modern times—before bureaucracy and government stinginess got in the way. Back then, plans were drawn up and budgets written to treat 5,000 patients in Ebola-stricken West Africa, and that was just the beginning. With some luck, Canada could help save tens of thousands more. And it could have the knock-on effect of breathing life into its biotechnology sector to help prepare for the next epidemic.
But the plans fell apart.
As shown in hundreds of pages of government documents obtained through Freedom of Information requests, the machinery of government crushed those well-intentioned plans. Interviews with those involved explain how bureaucratic infighting, tight budgets, and a partnership with a private tobacco company all contributed to Canada’s inability to get this life-saving treatment to those who needed it.
The genius researcher who pioneered the treatment would go on to focus on other things, including strains of coronaviruses. Last year, she was led out of the lab, escorted by the federal police as part of a secretive investigation about which the government remains mum. She is now the unfortunate target of international conspiracy theories.
As the world puts its shoulder to the wheel in search of a cure for COVID-19, the story of how Canada failed to fight Ebola serves as a cautionary tale as to what can go wrong.
A lab technician works in the Level 4 lab at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, Manitoba, on Nov. 3, 2014.
Around 2008 at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, Xiangguo Qiu was nearing a breakthrough. Like many Chinese scientists looking to further their work, Qiu—who was from Tianjin, China— had moved to Canada in 1996. She joined the Winnipeg lab in 2003, just a few years after it opened. Working in the special pathogens unit, Qiu’s job was to identify emergent viruses that could lead to epidemics, even pandemics. In the mid-2000s, Qiu turned to the Ebola virus, even though it hadn’t been seen on a large scale since its discovery in 1976.
Qiu spent years designing a cure for a virus that, by and large, hadn’t been seen in humans in decades. She began investigating a therapy, whereby she would flood the patient’s system with antibodies. Even if it sounds simple, that solution was not intuitive. Antibodies are Y-shaped proteins that are produced naturally by the body—they work by latching on to invading viruses and bacteria, flagging them for the white blood cells to attack. But what makes Ebola so deadly is its ability to kill those white blood cells, kneecapping the immune system’s response. Other researchers were far from convinced: If the white blood cells couldn’t respond effectively, what good were the antibodies?
“The conclusion was mainly that antibodies would never work against Ebola,” said Gary Kobinger, one of Canada’s most celebrated infectious disease experts who served as the chief of special pathogens for the lab until 2015. In an interview with Foreign Policy, he recalled that Qiu “kept pushing.”
Around that time, Canada’s then-Conservative Party government reduced the lab’s core funding by about a third.
“I had to stop a lot of projects and put them on ice because we just didn’t have money,” Kobinger said.
In clinical trials on various animals, ZMAb showed remarkable promise.
In the post-9/11 world, governments around the world had found themselves woefully unprepared for the possibility of an easy-to-carry-out chemical or biological attack. Labs worldwide were researching how to prevent outbreaks and stop the spread of deadly viruses.
In America, defense dollars flowed fast. The Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority was set up to help fund the research and development of countermeasures to viruses and pathogens that could be used in bioterrorism. At the end of the R&D process, there was the promise that the Pentagon might buy huge quantities of the treatment or vaccine for its national stockpile. It meant that labs could pioneer cures that might not have any short-term commercial application, but thanks to their clear nexus to national security, could still come out with a profit.
In Canada, researchers weren’t quite as lucky. Ottawa is significantly less liberal with its research funding than Washington, and there is not the same promise of government contracts for innovative firms. Especially at that time, under a tight-fisted conservative government, there was a tremendous push to develop medical advances that could be commercialized and offloaded from the government quickly. Qiu learned that well.
“I sat down with Qiu and said, ‘Listen, I might be the only one, but I believe in your antibodies,’ ” Kobinger told Foreign Policy. So the lab trials continued.
Qiu was right. Her research showed that if enough of these antibodies were introduced, they would glob on to and weigh down the virus, even blocking it from entering healthy cells. That gave the white blood cells a fighting chance to take down the invaders. It’s like an exploding dye pack in a bag of stolen money—not only does it identify a bank robber, but it may actually slow their getaway.
Economic necessity became the mother of new invention at the lab. While there was a long list of different antibodies that could be used as a therapy, Kobinger pushed Qiu to identify only the three most effective ones for future research. They called the result ZMAb—short for the three EBOV-GP-specific monoclonal antibodies—and they patented the treatment in 2009, uploading the details of the cure on publicly available American and Canadian patent databases.
In clinical trials on various animals, ZMAb showed remarkable promise. In one study, published in the journal Nature, the lab announced that taking the three antibodies would lead to “complete survival when administered at 24 hours post-infection” and would still be effective at fighting the virus as late as five days after symptoms began. But, as there had been no major outbreaks of Ebola in years — to that point, there had been only small outbreaks in West Africa, killing about 300 people a year — clinical trials in humans weren’t an option.
ZMAb would sit on a shelf. Just in case.
A Doctors Without Borders health worker carries a child suspected of having Ebola in Paynesville, Liberia, on Oct. 5, 2014.
On Aug. 8, 2014, the World Health Organization declared a public health emergency in West Africa. Ebola had spread quickly through rural areas of Guinea and had reached major cities in Liberia and Sierra Leone. It was already the worst outbreak of the virus ever recorded, with nearly 1,000 deaths, and it was only beginning.
At the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), officials were eager to confront the emerging outbreak.
“There is rapidly increasing high level interest in all matters pertaining to Ebola situation,” wrote Assistant Deputy Health Minister Rainer Engelhardt in an email obtained under Canada’s freedom of information laws.
In the years since Kobinger and Qiu patented their Ebola treatment a year after discovery, Canada had actually sold the licensing rights to ZMAb to Toronto biodefense company Defyrus, which wasn’t uncommon. The lab had limited capacity to bring ZMAb to market, so it made sense to open its development to the private sector. If an outbreak occurred and an emergency was declared, however, Canada always had the right to produce ZMAb on a noncommercial, or “compassionate use,” basis.
The nuts and bolts of Qiu’s innovative treatment were readily available online—the lab had published papers about ZMAb’s promise. In the early days of the 2014 outbreak, PHAC got a phone call from California-based Mapp Biopharmaceutical. The company had come up with its own antibody cocktail and wanted to collaborate. It had, in fact, already struck a sublicensing deal with Defyrus.
The Winnipeg lab saw no problem with that. In a way, both sides were on the same team. “For me, it’s not about my antibody, your antibody, I don’t care—what I want is the best treatment,” Kobinger said. It helped that Mapp Bio had significant grants from the U.S. government.
The National Microbiology Laboratory tested Mapp Bio’s treatment and found that one of its antibodies worked better than one of Qiu’s. The lab mixed the two Canadian antibodies with the one discovered in America and called the result ZMapp.
Getting private industry and government health agencies to work together should have been the hard part. But with the crisis in full flow, everyone at the table seemed keen to get started.
“PHAC came with all their big enthusiasm,” Kobinger recalled, “and said, ‘We need to make this in Canada. And we need to use this as a way to build capacity in Canada.’ ”
But Canada had little ability to mass-produce antibodies like the ones needed for ZMapp.
To make ZMapp, they would need a cell line—a culture, usually made up of Chinese hamster ovary cells, that would be used to replicate the antibodies in large quantities. Chinese hamsters have been the foundation of molecular biology for most of the past century. Researchers discovered around 1919 that they reproduce quickly; their immune system is very receptive to foreign pathogens and parasites; and they have relatively few chromosomes, making their genetics easier to understand. The only real downside is that they resist breeding in captivity. By the late 1950s, scientists discovered that an ovary cell from a female hamster could be quickly and efficiently cloned, and each could be used to replicate a chosen protein. In these rows of hamster cells, scientists had essentially created tiny biological factories. Cell lines.
The promise was endless. So much so that H.C. Hu, a Chinese researcher, smuggled out a small crate of hamsters as Mao Zedong’s forces approached Peking. He handed off the tiny rodents to Robert Briggs Watson, an American researcher studying a cure for malaria.
But even from those noble beginnings, there were fears that these cells could be used to nefarious ends. After Watson and H.C. Hu smuggled the rodents out of China to New York, they were accused by a germ warfare commission set up by the People’s Republic of China of war crimes and plotting a biological attack, resulting in H.C. Hu being sent to a “reeducation” detention camp. While the wild accusations were part of the Maoist paranoia of the 1950s in China, the cell lines that were created from this ground-breaking research could be used to replicate the pathogens just as much as they could reproduce a cure.
In Canada, there is really only one Chinese hamster ovary cell line available, and it belongs to the National Research Council (NRC), a government agency with a mandate to “take research impacts from the lab to the marketplace.”
“So who got involved?” Kobinger said. “NRC.”
While the NRC downplayed its involvement in the production of ZMapp, those involved say the agency was hungry to pass off this project to the better-financed Americans.
It should have been straight-forward: PHAC had the treatment, NRC had the cell line. Together, they should have been able to mass-produce the antibodies needed.
Instead, the bureaucratic wrangling began almost immediately. In late September 2014, NRC invoiced PHAC nearly $200,000 for its “services”—before any antibodies were even grown.
The NRC decided it was responsible for ZMapp and began running the show, Kobinger said. “They [NRC] were holding their cell line saying, no, you can’t have access to it.”
The NRC saw an opportunity to commercialize ZMapp. There were millions of dollars in grants available to whoever would be able to mass-produce it. That money wouldn’t come from shipping the treatment to Africa, however.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority “calls me and says, ‘Gary, I don’t understand, there’s these people at NRC who are telling us that these antibodies are theirs,” Kobinger recalled. “ ‘And we know they are developed by you. What they are telling us is that we’re going to develop these monoclonal antibodies in [Chinese hamster ovary] cells and you’re going to pay for it.’” Kobinger said he received a similar call from the Gates Foundation.
While the NRC, in emails to Foreign Policy, downplayed its involvement in the production of ZMapp, those involved say the agency was hungry to pass off this project to the better-financed Americans. But there was a big problem with that.
Mapp Bio, much like the Winnipeg lab, focused on diseases “where commercial markets are minimal,” Larry Zeitlin, president of Mapp Bio, told Foreign Policy. His company relies on grants, he explained, and U.S. agencies look for one key thing: “Innovation,” he said.
Mapp Bio wanted to do away with using Chinese hamster ovary cells to grow the antibodies. Plant cells, it hoped, would be faster and cheaper—specifically, tobacco plants.
A researcher at Icon Genetics in Halle, Germany, holds a nicotiana benthamiana plant, a close relative of tobacco, in a company greenhouse Aug. 14, 2014. Researchers developed a process to produce proteins and enzymes from the plant that would be used in the production of antibodies for ZMapp, a possible vaccine for the Ebola virus.
The motivations weren’t hard to identify. So Mapp Bio partnered with Kentucky BioProcessing, which had earlier that year been acquired by Reynolds American, one of the largest cigarette companies in the world.
“At the time, we were told, or there was evidence that, tobacco plants were actually faster and more effective,” said Greg Taylor, who served as Canada’s chief medical officer and head of the PHAC from 2014 to 2016. “That’s why we were interested.”
It was all hypothetical, however. Zeitlin confirmed that Mapp Bio had never brought a product to market using tobacco cells. While there is ample research on the promise of plant cells for this sort of production, regulators had not approved any drugs or therapies grown in plant cells. ZMapp would be their trial run.
The move was a public relations coup for the tobacco giant. ZMapp was a case study as to “How Big Tobacco and the Military Came Together,” as NBC News heralded it on Aug. 5, 2014, without mentioning that the treatment had been developed in Canada.
Gary Kobinger, then-chief of special pathogens at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, stands with some of the biosafety suits he wore regularly in 2013.
In October, a joint NRC/PHAC report was prepared. It laid out three possibilities to “fast-track production” of ZMapp.
One was to have Canada ask Mapp Bio to take over. The second was for Ottawa to produce ZMAb itself, without the Americans.
But the government opted for the third option: to find domestic producers to make two of the antibodies in Chinese hamster ovary cells and have Mapp Bio produce the third in tobacco plant cells. The cocktail would be combined in Canada and shipped to West Africa.
In nearly every case where the treatment was used, the patient survived.
The report concluded that despite the insistence from the Americans, tobacco plants would be “slower than the industry standard” and would not necessarily be more effective. There was a caveat: If the Americans couldn’t produce the antibodies, PHAC would find someone to do it in Canada.
The report requested $22 million to produce the Canadian antibodies, which would be enough to treat nearly 5,000 patients. That would serve as ZMapp’s human trial. The report envisioned a “long-term, large-scale” approach, recommending an additional $38 million be spent on a second round of production that could help treat up to 36,000 people.
Hiring Canadian firms to make two of the antibodies had the knock-on effect of financing the labs’ capital costs so they could mass-produce antibodies for other applications in the future; there was already emerging interest that antibody therapy could treat a host of other infectious diseases.
The first doses would be delivered to the Ebola-afflicted regions by March 2015.
Ebola survivor Kent Brantly arrives at a congressional hearing before the House in Washington on Sept. 16, 2014. Brantly contracted Ebola while working as the medical director for Samaritan’s Purse Ebola Care Center in Monrovia, Liberia. He was treated with the drug ZMapp nine days after falling ill and recovered.
As the bureaucratic cogs turned, PHAC was already receiving requests to treat health care workers who had contracted the virus in the field. Documents show that throughout 2014, Ottawa shipped more than a dozen doses of ZMapp and ZMAb throughout the United States, Europe, and West Africa to treat sick doctors and nurses, and Mapp Bio shipped a dozen more.
In nearly every case where the treatment was used, the patient survived.
“All the clinicians who called me said, ‘We are convinced that your stuff has saved the lives of these patients,’ ” Kobinger said.
Mapp Biopharmaceutical is based in San Diego, California.
Pretty much as soon as PHAC began trying to get the plan off the ground, it fell apart.
Two medium-sized labs, one in Montreal and the other in Toronto, were tapped to produce the antibodies. At least one of the labs viewed the contract as the first step toward scaling up to produce other lifesaving treatments in the future.
But the contracts weren’t for millions after all. The NRC contracts were inexplicably just $325,000 each.
Then there was the third antibody. The Americans never seemed to get the memo. Speaking to Foreign Policy recently, Zeitlin said the plan was news to him. “I’m not sure what your information about just one antibody is referring to,” he wrote in an email.
The NRC contracts weren’t for millions after all. They were inexplicably just $325,000 each.
Ottawa had successfully made a small quantity of two antibodies. But instead of forging ahead, it suddenly scuppered the plans, and no further contracts were issued to the companies. An internal report lamented that “significant investments required” and “limited financial incentives for the private sector” had stymied the project.
Conversations kept happening anyway. In November, both agencies had a call with Medicago, a Quebec City company, to discuss the “business proposal” for ZMapp. Medicago, like Mapp Bio, wanted to grow antibodies in tobacco plants; 40 percent of its company is owned by American cigarette giant Philip Morris.
That didn’t work, either. PHAC denied to Foreign Policy that it ever discussed ZMapp with the company, contradicting its own internal documents.
By the start of 2015, more than 8,000 were dead in West Africa.
In April 2015, Ottawa inked a $3 million contract with Mapp Bio for ZMapp. But the company had other orders to fill first, for the Pentagon, and it was pushed back. The final delivery date was scheduled for June 2016—the same month the outbreak officially ended, leaving more than 11,000 dead behind.
A spokesperson for PHAC, citing security reasons, refused to confirm how many doses were delivered. Mapp Bio confirmed that doses were provided to PHAC, but a nondisclosure agreement covers the contract.
Medical workers check on an Ebola patient in a biosecure emergency care unit in Beni, Democratic Republic of the Congo, on Aug. 15, 2018, after the second Ebola outbreak occurred.
Ottawa never sent more than a few dozen doses of ZMapp or ZMAb abroad.
“We were so ahead on all fronts,” Kobinger said, adding that it’s all “an unfortunate series of events.”
ZMapp had another chance, in August 2018, when a second outbreak began in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Mapp Bio quickly produced the necessary antibodies and sent ZMapp to the affected regions, where it was included in ongoing clinical trials. Canada had no involvement in those trials.
Yet preliminary results, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, showed that just half of the patients who received ZMapp survived. That’s a far cry from the high survival rates researchers had seen before.
Doctors who had been equipped with the tobacco plant-grown ZMapp found that patients’ bodies didn’t take the plant-based treatment as well.
Zeitlin told Foreign Policy there are a few explanations for why ZMapp performed poorly. The virus in the Democratic Republic of the Congo may not have been the same as the one from Guinea. Or ZMapp may not have been as effective as researchers once hoped.
But a third theory points more blame. “Quicker infusion may be important for antibody treatments,” Zeitlin said.
Qiu’s original idea behind the antibody therapy was to flood the patient’s system. When the National Microbiology Laboratory sent doses abroad, which had been grown in the lab using Chinese hamster ovary cells, that’s how they were administered—quickly.
But doctors who had been equipped with the tobacco plant-grown ZMapp found that patients’ bodies didn’t take the plant-based treatment as well. It had to be administered more slowly, over four hours.
Mapp Bio appeared to recognize the problem even before the clinical results came in. Zeitlin said the plan had been to abandon tobacco plants and move to the Chinese hamster ovary cell production. But after ZMapp had been shown to be less effective, it was excluded from future trials.
“Further development is discontinued,” Zeitlin said.
The 2018 outbreak was officially declared over on June 25. It left more than 2,200 dead in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, primarily in the northeast. A new outbreak, in the northwest, was declared in early June.
Health workers assist a patient suspected of having Ebola on their way to an Ebola treatment center run by the French Red Cross in Patrice near Macenta, Guinea, on Nov. 21, 2014.
ZMapp didn’t have to end this way.
Mapp Bio pursued the strategy it did because the nature of private-sector research required it. “When you try and actually develop things from a proactive need, public-good perspective, it’s very difficult,” said Taylor, the former PHAC head.
But there was no reason why Ottawa could not have gotten ZMapp out the door as originally planned, back in early 2015, when it was needed most.
“PHAC came out with good intentions and a good plan and good everything but got completely stalled and neutralized by the NRC,” Kobinger said. It was all because of “a few people.”
Kobinger added: “From the beginning, it was definitely a strategic mistake to have pushed so hard for tobacco plants.”
A spokesperson for the NRC insisted that there was no “push to establish a ‘business case’ to develop a plant-based production process for ZMAb.” That’s directly contradicted by memos and emails from the NRC itself, which repeatedly cite the need to find a commercial justification for the treatment.
“What needed to happen, which did not happen, is that somebody with a reasonable mind at a very high level, at the ministerial level maybe, needed to sit everyone down and say, ‘You’re crazy. This is happening. We’re trying to help the world,’ ” Kobinger said.
National Microbiology Lab officials and scientists (from left) Gary Kobinger, Frank Plummer, and Heinz Feldmann talk at a press conference in Winnipeg on Sept. 17, 2007, about their plans to send a team to the Democratic Republic of the Congo to assist with an outbreak of Ebola. After years at the lab, Kobinger left in 2015—the bureaucratic infighting over ZMAb being a big driver.
While ZMapp may be effectively dead, the ideas behind it live on.
Zeitlin said Mapp Bio is now pursuing a new treatment for Ebola and the similar Marburg virus. Monoclonal antibody treatments are also showing promise in fighting HIV. “That is what I’m the most excited about,” Kobinger said.
Two monoclonal antibody treatments in the Congo trials, which were developed after Qiu’s breakthrough, were shown to be effective. (Both were administered quicker than ZMapp.) The developer of one of those treatments, Regeneron, hopes to soon have a three-antibody cocktail to treat COVID-19.
There is still a push to bring big tobacco into the lab, too. In March, Kentucky BioProcessing and Reynolds American announced they are “in the process of developing a vaccine candidate [for COVID-19] that we hope to have available for testing within the next few weeks,” said Kaelan Hollon, a spokesperson for Reynolds American. British American Tobacco has made a similar announcement.
Kobinger left the Winnipeg lab in 2015. The bureaucratic infighting over ZMAb was a big driver, he said. He recalls telling Qiu at the time: “If I want to stay ahead of this curve, a little bit, and I still have a chance to contribute, I need to leave and go into academia.” Kobinger is now at Laval University’s Infectious Disease Research Centre in Quebec City. Recently, he has partnered with Medicago to develop antibodies that could help fight COVID-19.
Neither the Royal Canadian Mounted Police nor the federal government will explain what Qiu is alleged to have done. She has not been charged with a crime.
Qiu continued working at the National Microbiology Laboratory. In 2017, she penned a prescient article with a colleague lamenting the lack of funding to research vaccines for coronaviruses.
Given the cost and time it can take, she wrote, “there is a lack of incentive from agencies to fund research into and develop vaccines against obscure pathogens that may or may not cause outbreaks in humans.”
Qiu’s work, however, was cut short. In July 2019, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police entered the Winnipeg lab and escorted her off the premises. Neither the RCMP nor the federal government will explain what Qiu is alleged to have done. She has not been charged with a crime.
Qiu had been working with the Level 4 laboratory in Wuhan, China, in the years before her removal. The Winnipeg Free Press reported that the RCMP investigation found that Qiu failed to follow protocols for how deadly viruses, including Ebola, were sent to colleagues in China. Kobinger told Foreign Policy he believes Qiu followed all appropriate protocols and that the allegations are bureaucratic in nature and overblown.
As COVID-19 began spreading in Wuhan, conspiracy theories percolated. ZeroHedge, a pseudonymous blog known to peddle Russian disinformation, alleged that Qiu gave the coronavirus to the Wuhan lab, which was weaponized by Beijing.
These theories have been debunked. Researchers say there is zero evidence the virus was made in a lab. Qiu’s life work, Kobinger said, has been to help the world battle pandemics like this.
Canada could have produced the necessary antibodies, which could have saved lives in West Africa. It could have scaled up domestic capacity to produce lifesaving treatments for infectious diseases. It could have treated its internationally renowned researchers better.
It failed across the board. African victims of Ebola paid the price. Will the handling of possible coronavirus vaccines be any better?


foreignpolicy--2020-06-29--Why a Trade War With China Is a Bad Idea for India

Why a Trade War With China Is a Bad Idea for India Relations between the United States and China have sunk to such lows in recent years that it is now easy enough to imagine the two nations eventually going to war .
Yet this month ’ s deadly Himalayan skirmishes suggest China is far likelier to usher in a new era of military conflict with its neighbor India .
Both nations now face dilemmas as they seek to avoid that prospect , after their monthlong standoff degenerated into a bloody fracas in mid-June , leaving 20 Indian soldiers dead @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Deescalating the crisis will be hard enough .
More important will be how each side rethinks the countries ’ long-term relationship as strategic competitors .
Of the two , India faces tougher challenges : With limited military options , Prime Minister Narendra Modi is facing growing pressure to boycott Chinese goods as part of a more general turn toward self-reliance and protectionism—a strategy that would be precisely the wrong way to tackle the long-term threat of a rising China .
China ’ s dilemma is simpler : namely , whether it is wise @ @ @ @ @ @ @ once .
That Beijing is riling its neighborhood is obvious .
Australia complains about Chinese cyberattacks , albeit without directly naming China .
Japan is alarmed about Chinese patrols near the disputed Senkaku or Diaoyu islands .
And now China is clashing with India , a country whose security establishment increasingly views its northern neighbor as a threat , and is currently puzzling through how to respond .
That marks a significant change .
India has grown closer to the United States over recent decades , both militarily and politically .
But it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ like the U.S.-led “ free and open Indo-Pacific , ” let alone becoming a full U.S. treaty ally .
This is in part because Modi considers Donald Trump unreliable , having reportedly been shocked by the U.S. president ’ s views in private meetings .
One incident , recounted in the recent book A Very Stable Genius , tells of Modi ’ s shock that Trump appeared not to know that India and China even shared a border : “ This is not a serious man .
I can not count on this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Modi ’ s impression of Trump , one presidential aide told the book ’ s author .
But just as important have been deep-seated worries that drawing too close to the United States would end up alienating China .
Fears that ties with Beijing had grown too frayed led Modi to initiate a rapprochement after another border standoff in 2017 , leading to a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping the following year in Wuhan , China .
That earlier round of tensions was resolved with plenty of airy talk of a new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ current clashes seem unlikely to end as neatly .
“ This is a very fundamental change , ” one senior former Indian security official told me earlier this month , referring to way the sharply negative change in India ’ s views about its neighbor in the aftermath of recent events .
“ Our whole policy and discourse around China will have to change.
” That leaves India with few good options .
India might be able to hold its own along parts of its Himalayan border .
But in general it remains @ @ @ @ @ @ @ New Delhi has upped its armed forces spending of late to about $ 71.1 billion , the world ’ s third-highest , after China and the United States .
But its military is inefficient , underequipped , and dogged by procurement corruption scandals .
Facing a dreadful coronavirus-driven recession , India ’ s economic position over the coming few years is unlikely to be much stronger .
Any response Modi pursues will then be complicated by the decisive anti-Chinese turn in Indian public opinion .
Bellicose television anchors demand action , while social @ @ @ @ @ @ @ men destroying Chinese-made televisions .
In under a month , India is likely to have joined such countries as Japan and South Korea , and perhaps also the United States , as part of a select group of China ’ s rivals nations whose publics also have sharply negative views of China itself .
Modi will be well aware that angry publics can create pressure for an unwise military repost , given this is at least part of the reason India was drawn into a disastrous losing war against China in 1962 .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ has resisted this path , delivering a reasonably measured response , including calmly negotiating the release of 10 captured Indian soldiers .
Escalating militarily would in any case be a hugely risky step , both given China ’ s broad military superiority and the unforgiving Himalayan terrain the two nations are contesting .
So with most military options mostly off the table , Modi is under greater pressure to escalate economically instead—and to do so in ways that could hurt India ’ s own long-term interests .
As a # BoycottChina social media @ @ @ @ @ @ @ smartphones hint at larger frustrations over India ’ s unbalanced trade relationship with China .
India ’ s trade deficit with China was roughly $ 57 billion last year , a giant figure when bilateral trade totals just $ 92.5 billion .
About half of India ’ s electronics imports come from China , as do two-thirds of the materials it needs to make drugs for its lucrative generic pharmaceuticals sector .
In both cases the government will do its best to boost domestic production , although earlier efforts to achieve this goal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely to join the United States and European Union in limiting Chinese investments , adding to existing curbs on Chinese funding of Indian tech start-ups brought in earlier this year .
Delhi is now mulling banning the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei , too—a significant step that would have been highly improbable prior to the crisis , given worries among cash-strapped Indian telecoms companies about the cost of non-Chinese equipment .
Some of these steps are appropriate , if targeted carefully .
India should aspire to make more of its own electronics and drug @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it could build 5G telecoms networks without Chinese parts .
It also needs to be wary of the threat of Chinese future economic coercion if relations between the two powers worsen , for instance the risk that Beijing might in future limit exports of pharmaceutical inputs , just as it recently imposed punitive tariffs on Australian crop exports after a diplomatic spat .
Yet all these steps also come with costs , at a time when India ’ s battered economy is already struggling .
India ’ s potentially vast consumer market is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tech sector has attracted funds from Chinese investors .
But arbitrary import restrictions or consumer boycotts will be largely self-defeating .
And , crucially , they are unlikely to deter China from further aggressive military actions in future .
The real risks of launching a mini trade war against China are longer-term : It will encourage India to continue its slide toward the dead end of economic self-reliance .
Under Modi it has already taken tentative steps down this path .
Attempts to transform India into a manufacturing and exporting powerhouse have almost @ @ @ @ @ @ @ chance to enter the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership , an Indo-Pacific trade pact .
Powerful voices within his ruling Hindu nationalist party dislike trade and economic openness on principle , hankering for a return to an earlier era of hopeless economic isolation .
Modi ’ s political base among small-scale farmers and shopkeepers have long resisted greater economic openness , too .
All this would be a momentous mistake .
India will struggle to compete militarily with China until it finds a way to rekindle an economy that was sputtering badly even before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ considerations might warrant some modest , carefully targeted restrictions on trade with China .
But this means India will also need to work harder to build trading ties with other nations , and especially so elsewhere in Asia .
Balancing China abroad and deterring it domestically is a long-term project , and one that needs money to fund military expansion at home .
And if India is to develop a wider range of strategic relationships with nations like Australia , Japan , and South Korea as part of a plan to counter China @ @ @ @ @ @ @ underpin these with stronger economic ties .
Over recent weeks , China ’ s decision to pursue minor tactical advantages in the Himalayas has come at the huge strategic cost of transforming India from a skeptical neighbor into something much more clearly resembling a geopolitical adversary .
Yet it is far from impossible to imagine that China ’ s assertive military behavior might ultimately have the perverse effect of pushing India in an inward economic direction whose long-term beneficiary is China itself .
India should avoid this path .
As Modi weighs how @ @ @ @ @ @ @ India has scant ability to hurt China economically , but it has plenty of ability to hurt itself .

Relations between the United States and China have sunk to such lows in recent years that it is now easy enough to imagine the two nations eventually going to war. Yet this month’s deadly Himalayan skirmishes suggest China is far likelier to usher in a new era of military conflict with its neighbor India.
Relations between the United States and China have sunk to such lows in recent years that it is now easy enough to imagine the two nations eventually going to war. Yet this month’s deadly Himalayan skirmishes suggest China is far likelier to usher in a new era of military conflict with its neighbor India.
Both nations now face dilemmas as they seek to avoid that prospect, after their monthlong standoff degenerated into a bloody fracas in mid-June, leaving 20 Indian soldiers dead alongside an unknown number of Chinese. Deescalating the crisis will be hard enough. More important will be how each side rethinks the countries’ long-term relationship as strategic competitors. Of the two, India faces tougher challenges: With limited military options, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is facing growing pressure to boycott Chinese goods as part of a more general turn toward self-reliance and protectionism—a strategy that would be precisely the wrong way to tackle the long-term threat of a rising China.
China’s dilemma is simpler: namely, whether it is wise to antagonize all of its competitors at once. That Beijing is riling its neighborhood is obvious. Australia complains about Chinese cyberattacks, albeit without directly naming China. Japan is alarmed about Chinese patrols near the disputed Senkaku or Diaoyu islands. And now China is clashing with India, a country whose security establishment increasingly views its northern neighbor as a threat, and is currently puzzling through how to respond.
That marks a significant change. India has grown closer to the United States over recent decades, both militarily and politically. But it has stopped short of fully backing ideas like the U.S.-led “free and open Indo-Pacific,” let alone becoming a full U.S. treaty ally. This is in part because Modi considers Donald Trump unreliable, having reportedly been shocked by the U.S. president’s views in private meetings. One incident, recounted in the recent book A Very Stable Genius, tells of Modi’s shock that Trump appeared not to know that India and China even shared a border: “This is not a serious man. I cannot count on this man as a partner,” was Modi’s impression of Trump, one presidential aide told the book’s author. But just as important have been deep-seated worries that drawing too close to the United States would end up alienating China. Fears that ties with Beijing had grown too frayed led Modi to initiate a rapprochement after another border standoff in 2017, leading to a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping the following year in Wuhan, China.
That earlier round of tensions was resolved with plenty of airy talk of a new and amicable “Wuhan spirit.” The current clashes seem unlikely to end as neatly. “This is a very fundamental change,” one senior former Indian security official told me earlier this month, referring to way the sharply negative change in India’s views about its neighbor in the aftermath of recent events. “Our whole policy and discourse around China will have to change.”
That leaves India with few good options. India might be able to hold its own along parts of its Himalayan border. But in general it remains by far the weaker power militarily. New Delhi has upped its armed forces spending of late to about $71.1 billion, the world’s third-highest, after China and the United States. But its military is inefficient, underequipped, and dogged by procurement corruption scandals. Facing a dreadful coronavirus-driven recession, India’s economic position over the coming few years is unlikely to be much stronger.
Any response Modi pursues will then be complicated by the decisive anti-Chinese turn in Indian public opinion. Bellicose television anchors demand action, while social media is filled with clips of angry men destroying Chinese-made televisions. In under a month, India is likely to have joined such countries as Japan and South Korea, and perhaps also the United States, as part of a select group of China’s rivals nations whose publics also have sharply negative views of China itself.
Modi will be well aware that angry publics can create pressure for an unwise military repost, given this is at least part of the reason India was drawn into a disastrous losing war against China in 1962. So far, at least, Delhi has resisted this path, delivering a reasonably measured response, including calmly negotiating the release of 10 captured Indian soldiers. Escalating militarily would in any case be a hugely risky step, both given China’s broad military superiority and the unforgiving Himalayan terrain the two nations are contesting. So with most military options mostly off the table, Modi is under greater pressure to escalate economically instead—and to do so in ways that could hurt India’s own long-term interests.
As a #BoycottChina social media campaign gains speed, protesters smashing Chinese-made smartphones hint at larger frustrations over India’s unbalanced trade relationship with China. India’s trade deficit with China was roughly $57 billion last year, a giant figure when bilateral trade totals just $92.5 billion. About half of India’s electronics imports come from China, as do two-thirds of the materials it needs to make drugs for its lucrative generic pharmaceuticals sector. In both cases the government will do its best to boost domestic production, although earlier efforts to achieve this goal have achieved little. It is also likely to join the United States and European Union in limiting Chinese investments, adding to existing curbs on Chinese funding of Indian tech start-ups brought in earlier this year. Delhi is now mulling banning the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, too—a significant step that would have been highly improbable prior to the crisis, given worries among cash-strapped Indian telecoms companies about the cost of non-Chinese equipment.
Some of these steps are appropriate, if targeted carefully. India should aspire to make more of its own electronics and drug ingredients and would be more secure if it could build 5G telecoms networks without Chinese parts. It also needs to be wary of the threat of Chinese future economic coercion if relations between the two powers worsen, for instance the risk that Beijing might in future limit exports of pharmaceutical inputs, just as it recently imposed punitive tariffs on Australian crop exports after a diplomatic spat.
Yet all these steps also come with costs, at a time when India’s battered economy is already struggling. India’s potentially vast consumer market is attractive to Chinese companies, and its tech sector has attracted funds from Chinese investors. But arbitrary import restrictions or consumer boycotts will be largely self-defeating.
And, crucially, they are unlikely to deter China from further aggressive military actions in future.
The real risks of launching a mini trade war against China are longer-term: It will encourage India to continue its slide toward the dead end of economic self-reliance. Under Modi it has already taken tentative steps down this path. Attempts to transform India into a manufacturing and exporting powerhouse have almost entirely failed. Modi passed on the chance to enter the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, an Indo-Pacific trade pact. Powerful voices within his ruling Hindu nationalist party dislike trade and economic openness on principle, hankering for a return to an earlier era of hopeless economic isolation. Modi’s political base among small-scale farmers and shopkeepers have long resisted greater economic openness, too.
All this would be a momentous mistake. India will struggle to compete militarily with China until it finds a way to rekindle an economy that was sputtering badly even before the calamity of COVID-19. Genuine security considerations might warrant some modest, carefully targeted restrictions on trade with China. But this means India will also need to work harder to build trading ties with other nations, and especially so elsewhere in Asia. Balancing China abroad and deterring it domestically is a long-term project, and one that needs money to fund military expansion at home. And if India is to develop a wider range of strategic relationships with nations like Australia, Japan, and South Korea as part of a plan to counter China, it will also need to be underpin these with stronger economic ties.
Over recent weeks, China’s decision to pursue minor tactical advantages in the Himalayas has come at the huge strategic cost of transforming India from a skeptical neighbor into something much more clearly resembling a geopolitical adversary. Yet it is far from impossible to imagine that China’s assertive military behavior might ultimately have the perverse effect of pushing India in an inward economic direction whose long-term beneficiary is China itself. India should avoid this path. As Modi weighs how to respond, he must recognize that India has scant ability to hurt China economically, but it has plenty of ability to hurt itself.


foreignpolicy--2020-06-29--Attacks on the Press Track a Democratic Backslide

The recent conviction of the journalist Maria Ressa in the Philippines for “ cyber libel ” has brought into sharp relief the global deterioration of press freedom .
Across the world , fundamental freedoms of association , expression , and assembly are under threat .
A recent report from Civicus found that twice as many people live under repression today as a year ago .
Although much of that is due to diminishing freedoms in countries whose governments have long been known for their heavy hands , an increasing number of attacks on the media have come in places where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ increasing number of attacks on the media have come in places where press freedom was once enshrined .
Governments from Russia to Venezuela are using a range of tools to suppress freedom of the press and intimidate journalists , including censorship , restrictive or repressive legislation , harassment , false charges and arrests , physical attacks , and defamation .
Bangladesh passed the Digital Security Act in 2018 , which authorizes up to 14 years ’ imprisonment for secretly recording government officials and up to 10 years for spreading negative propaganda about the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ allows police to arrest journalists without a court order .
Egypt , which is a leader in jailing journalists , now allows the state to block websites and certain social media accounts if they are perceived to be national security threats .
Some 500 websites , including human rights and news organizations , have already been blocked .
In such cases , protecting the nation and curbing misinformation are used as excuses to muzzle the press .
More striking still is the erosion of press freedoms seen in democracies such as Argentina , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Media defamation suits and violence against journalists in Argentina , as well as raids on news headquarters in Australia , suggest that governments are afraid of investigative journalists and independent media .
Perhaps nowhere is the situation as precarious as in the United States , where the freedom of the press is guaranteed by the Constitution but has been steadily undermined .
Since before his 2016 election as U.S. president , Donald Trump has undermined the credibility of journalists and news outlets , while spreading misinformation during press conferences and through social media @ @ @ @ @ @ @ during briefings and routinely referred to the media as “ fake news.
” This , in turn , has led to calls for violence against the media by some members of the public—particularly in recent weeks during media efforts to cover U.S. protests .
More than 400 journalists have been physically harmed or arrested in the United States since late May , during the wave of recent protests against the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis .
( By comparison , before the protests , U.S. Press Freedom Tracker had recorded 155 incidents @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reporters with pepper spray , rubber bullets , and projectiles , and have arrested journalists , despite them identifying themselves as members of the media .
“ We yelled , ‘ We ’ re media , ’ to which they responded , ‘ We don ’ t care , ’ ” said MSNBC reporter Ali Velshi as he described an incident during which Minneapolis police shot rubber bullets at him .
Beyond physical harm , police violence against journalists—and Washington ’ s efforts to chisel away at press freedom in general—have serious implications @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reporters , objective and professional documentation of what is happening in real time is diminished .
An increase in impunity , where police officers and state officials believe they are above accountability , follows .
Further , the spread of misinformation and disinformation results in a general distrust of the media .
Conspiracy theories abounded on social media in the aftermath of the killing of Floyd with some alleging that he was still alive , and others spreading rumors that outside forces or agitators ( including philanthropist George Soros ) were behind the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ uploading of photographs and videos of their marches has been essential to information sharing , the challenges of misinformation and disinformation mean that there is still a place for institutional media sources .
The protest-related attacks on media figures are the most violent yet , but they speak to a systemic effort by government agencies to undermine free press .
Journalists reporting on migrant caravans in 2018 were singled out for lengthy screenings and questioning by the U.S. government .
In some cases , their electronic devices were searched , too , as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ government .
The Centers for Disease Control , a crucial source of information during the pandemic , recently issued a ban on responding to questions from Voice of America , citing as justification a recent White House memo denouncing the outlet as a promoter of “ foreign propaganda.
” The erosion of press freedom in the United States does not exist in a vacuum .
Rather , as the U.S. president disregards the First Amendment , autocrats and dictators draw from his playbook and demonize the press and restrict civil liberties and freedoms @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hows that more than 50 leaders from around the world have used Trump ’ s term “ fake news ” to justify their actions to muzzle freedom of the press , including Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro , Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban , Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro , and Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte .
Bolsonaro , sometimes known as the “ Trump of the Tropics , ” has attacked the media as fake news , and said that the Brazilian public no longer trusts the mainstream media .
Duterte has said that reporters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” and when he referred to the media as “ spies ” during a 2017 Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit , Trump laughed .
The impacts of leaders ’ disinformation campaigns—from harassment to sectarian violence to worse—are well documented .
It is critical that government and industry leaders step up before it is too late .
Politicians , police , and other government officials and agencies must be held accountable for words and actions that cause harm to individual journalists and reduce freedom of the press .
Social media platforms must hold @ @ @ @ @ @ @ removing posts that are incendiary or false , flagging them as promoting untruths , or simply shutting down their accounts .
While Twitter has begun to flag incendiary posts with a warning message and recently removed a video clip manipulated to look as if CNN was spreading misinformation , it must go further .
Social media platforms should simply delete posts by elected leaders that perpetuate falsehoods and traffic in racist and violent messages , and should suspend the accounts of officials who repeatedly flout the norms .
Newsrooms must strengthen and diversify @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , citizen journalists , and communities .
And publishers must diversify newsrooms by race in order to generate and disseminate more inclusive and legitimate coverage that draws upon more viewpoints and that builds trust and connections with a broader public .
This isn ’ t just a nicety : Research points to the role of the predominantly white press in “ fanning the flames of racial violence , ” including the controversial recent op-ed in the New York Times by Sen. Tom Cotton calling for the U.S. military to subdue Black Lives Matter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reached easily , and the work won ’ t be finished even once they are .
But there is a broad demand for such efforts .
Even as governments chip away at an open media , research shows that support for freedom of the press has increased in many countries , with the United States showing an increase of 13 percent between 2015 and 2019 .
The growth of civil society and independent media is a hallmark of democratic expansion in recent decades—they hold power to account and create critical space for public @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is essential to stem the democratic backsliding around the world .

The recent conviction of the journalist Maria Ressa in the Philippines for “cyber libel” has brought into sharp relief the global deterioration of press freedom. Across the world, fundamental freedoms of association, expression, and assembly are under threat. A recent report from Civicus found that twice as many people live under repression today as a year ago . Although much of that is due to diminishing freedoms in countries whose governments have long been known for their heavy hands, an increasing number of attacks on the media have come in places where press freedom was once enshrined.
The recent conviction of the journalist Maria Ressa in the Philippines for “cyber libel” has brought into sharp relief the global deterioration of press freedom. Across the world, fundamental freedoms of association, expression, and assembly are under threat. A recent report from Civicus found that twice as many people live under repression today as a year ago. Although much of that is due to diminishing freedoms in countries whose governments have long been known for their heavy hands, an increasing number of attacks on the media have come in places where press freedom was once enshrined.
An increasing number of attacks on the media have come in places where press freedom was once enshrined. Governments from Russia to Venezuela are using a range of tools to suppress freedom of the press and intimidate journalists, including censorship, restrictive or repressive legislation, harassment, false charges and arrests, physical attacks, and defamation. Bangladesh passed the Digital Security Act in 2018, which authorizes up to 14 years’ imprisonment for secretly recording government officials and up to 10 years for spreading negative propaganda about the 1971 war of independence; it also allows police to arrest journalists without a court order. Egypt, which is a leader in jailing journalists, now allows the state to block websites and certain social media accounts if they are perceived to be national security threats. Some 500 websites, including human rights and news organizations, have already been blocked. In such cases, protecting the nation and curbing misinformation are used as excuses to muzzle the press.
More striking still is the erosion of press freedoms seen in democracies such as Argentina, Australia, and the United Kingdom. Media defamation suits and violence against journalists in Argentina, as well as raids on news headquarters in Australia, suggest that governments are afraid of investigative journalists and independent media. Perhaps nowhere is the situation as precarious as in the United States, where the freedom of the press is guaranteed by the Constitution but has been steadily undermined.
Since before his 2016 election as U.S. president, Donald Trump has undermined the credibility of journalists and news outlets, while spreading misinformation during press conferences and through social media. He has singled out individual journalists during briefings and routinely referred to the media as “fake news.” This, in turn, has led to calls for violence against the media by some members of the public—particularly in recent weeks during media efforts to cover U.S. protests.
More than 400 journalists have been physically harmed or arrested in the United States since late May, during the wave of recent protests against the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. (By comparison, before the protests, U.S. Press Freedom Tracker had recorded 155 incidents since 2017.) Police have targeted reporters with pepper spray, rubber bullets, and projectiles, and have arrested journalists, despite them identifying themselves as members of the media. “We yelled, ‘We’re media,’ to which they responded, ‘We don’t care,’” said MSNBC reporter Ali Velshi as he described an incident during which Minneapolis police shot rubber bullets at him.
Beyond physical harm, police violence against journalists—and Washington’s efforts to chisel away at press freedom in general—have serious implications for the country. Without protections for reporters, objective and professional documentation of what is happening in real time is diminished. An increase in impunity, where police officers and state officials believe they are above accountability, follows.
Further, the spread of misinformation and disinformation results in a general distrust of the media. Conspiracy theories abounded on social media in the aftermath of the killing of Floyd with some alleging that he was still alive, and others spreading rumors that outside forces or agitators (including philanthropist George Soros) were behind the protests. Although protesters’ reporting and uploading of photographs and videos of their marches has been essential to information sharing, the challenges of misinformation and disinformation mean that there is still a place for institutional media sources.
The protest-related attacks on media figures are the most violent yet, but they speak to a systemic effort by government agencies to undermine free press. Journalists reporting on migrant caravans in 2018 were singled out for lengthy screenings and questioning by the U.S. government. In some cases, their electronic devices were searched, too, as part of dossiers developed by the U.S. government. The Centers for Disease Control, a crucial source of information during the pandemic, recently issued a ban on responding to questions from Voice of America, citing as justification a recent White House memo denouncing the outlet as a promoter of “foreign propaganda.”
The erosion of press freedom in the United States does not exist in a vacuum. Rather, as the U.S. president disregards the First Amendment, autocrats and dictators draw from his playbook and demonize the press and restrict civil liberties and freedoms. Research by the New York Times hows that more than 50 leaders from around the world have used Trump’s term “fake news” to justify their actions to muzzle freedom of the press, including Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, and Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. Bolsonaro, sometimes known as the “Trump of the Tropics,” has attacked the media as fake news, and said that the Brazilian public no longer trusts the mainstream media. Duterte has said that reporters are “not exempt from assassination,” and when he referred to the media as “spies” during a 2017 Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit, Trump laughed.
The impacts of leaders’ disinformation campaigns—from harassment to sectarian violence to worse—are well documented.
It is critical that government and industry leaders step up before it is too late. Politicians, police, and other government officials and agencies must be held accountable for words and actions that cause harm to individual journalists and reduce freedom of the press. Social media platforms must hold these leaders to account, whether by removing posts that are incendiary or false, flagging them as promoting untruths, or simply shutting down their accounts. While Twitter has begun to flag incendiary posts with a warning message and recently removed a video clip manipulated to look as if CNN was spreading misinformation, it must go further. Social media platforms should simply delete posts by elected leaders that perpetuate falsehoods and traffic in racist and violent messages, and should suspend the accounts of officials who repeatedly flout the norms.
Newsrooms must strengthen and diversify media sources, including through local media, citizen journalists, and communities. And publishers must diversify newsrooms by race in order to generate and disseminate more inclusive and legitimate coverage that draws upon more viewpoints and that builds trust and connections with a broader public. This isn’t just a nicety: Research points to the role of the predominantly white press in “fanning the flames of racial violence,” including the controversial recent op-ed in the New York Times by Sen. Tom Cotton calling for the U.S. military to subdue Black Lives Matter protests.
These goals will not be reached easily, and the work won’t be finished even once they are. But there is a broad demand for such efforts. Even as governments chip away at an open media, research shows that support for freedom of the press has increased in many countries, with the United States showing an increase of 13 percent between 2015 and 2019.
The growth of civil society and independent media is a hallmark of democratic expansion in recent decades—they hold power to account and create critical space for public discourse. Preserving and promoting press freedom is essential to stem the democratic backsliding around the world.