Coronavirus - what to do and how to act

We are in probably the most serious crisis most of us ever have been – and that is a time of strong emotions and worries. Based on my experience in China I want to give suggestions how to get the Western world back running in the first part of my post. Second is my “Corona-Virus-Diary”. Thomas Kuhn of the WirtschaftsWoche contacted me and asked me if I want to share how my life with the virus in China was. I wrote it down because I hoped it could probably help changing some people′s behavior. At the end of this post I give more explanation why I think the numbers in China are right and who will be the winners of the crisis.

I am total fine when you don′t agree with my personal point of view – yet please read my arguments at the end and react with good arguments before you write something emotional. Thank you. Anyhow, this here is my personal, subjective point of view.

Basis of my thesis is – we face a natural disaster nobody should be blamed for and the numbers in China are right.

When you feel strong opposition already with this statement that is fine, I am happy to discuss objective but please read first my explanations at the end before you react. Anyhow, sometimes it is good to take a deep breath…

What are the right measurements to stop quarantine and still make secure the virus does not spread? Yes, I know, you can′t hear it anymore yet I say it one more time - follow the Chinese way. BUT, do it the Western way. Do it freely because you understand that it is the right to do (fine to read more arguments at the end…).

1. Stay at home and just meet people who also follow the quarantine measures well, yes, you got it
2. Wear masks, even when it just protects others that you do not infect them
3. Use Apps to track down every contact point and inform automatically every person who had contact with an infected – don′t misuse the data, make the data anonym and stop talking about data leaks but start using the many apps which were developed, make one the standard (governments, how would it be to finally be a little bit faster in this situation and act, and not just react?!) and make it as a pass to enter stores, companies, etc. – it is more important to get the infections down than discussing potential data leaks.
4. Start measuring fever wherever people enter public spaces (in combination with 3. and everyone who has fever let him make a corona-test). Yes, not everyone who has the virus has fever and still he is infectious – but that′s why everyone shall wear masks, see 2...
5. Make secure infected people are quarantined or stay at least at home
6. Disinfect more
7. Start back your normal life

That′s it. Does not sound too complicated right? Then let′s make it happen. And by that, the shutdown can be opened fastly step by step to normal.

When the Western governments would have followed the Chinese speed then you would be already back to normal.

But yes, fine to talk further about this after my diary…

 My personal corona diary

--the following was written for the German magazine WirtschaftsWoche until 21st March 2020, please take this in mind while reading--

The articles were online published in the following parts: Part1, Part2, Part3, Part4, Part5, Part6.

See here a preview of the article, please buy the actual WirtschaftsWoche number 15, since Friday, 3rd April available at kiosks all over Germany:

Prologue

Why am I publishing the diary? Because I believe that many people in Germany still think as I thought à month ago - and I hope that my “story” helps to encourage more people to strictly follow public recommendations - that the western world can defeat the virus as China has already done. United it is possible - but only united. Without the authoritarian force it would not have worked for me, I am honest. I would be happy if Germany shows the world that democracies can be as efficient at fighting the virus as China was and is. Then the virus has no chance. And given the public standstill, that's the only way - we have to defeat the virus together. From my point of view and based on my experience in China, I say - it is possible.

Part 1 from 22nd until 29th January - the virus is showing up in public

On January 22nd our Chinese New Year holiday begin, our factories are scheduled to be on vacation until 2nd February. We look forward to spending time with the family, activities in Shenzhen and that we can do renovations on our apartment.

In Wuhan, there are a little over 500 people with a new virus infected, but honestly, I am not at all interested. None of the "big" epidemics of the past 20 years have had any impact on my life.

I laugh at my wife, who rushes to a pharmacy at 10pm to organize protective masks for us privately. The next day, people stand meters and meters out of the pharmacies on the street ... I think they're all crazy.

On January 24th I discuss with a German entrepreneur that we should meet for dinner - and we joke about that we shall put on mouth masks. We haven't met until today... 25th January is the last time we go out to eat. It's a funny picture - my mother-in-law, her friend and my wife wear masks, I refuse to do that and my children don't wear them either ... we walk through a completely empty and extinct city, it feels like a bad apocalyptic movie. We are the only ones in the restaurant, everything is surreal. This is the last time that my children leave the house for the next four weeks ...

On January 26th my wife is in a very bad mood - because the school does not start on time - it is planned that the school will start à week later. For my wife, the education of our children is the most important thing. The next day, Wuhan decides to build a hospital in ten days - so of course only comparison which comes to my mind are comparisons with the Berlin airport...

On January 28th we learn that we can only reopen our company when we have for every worker N95 protective masks. We buy 2,000 masks in the USA and I am annoyed that we have to throw 3000USD out of the window for something so useless... We have to buy them in the USA because all protective masks are sold out in China ... I should have ordered a million masks that time ...

In Germany, the Webasto case is published widely by the media – and I am later proud that the Western system works so well in detaining all infected people… That were days ... Since nothing is left open, I decide to make the best out of the situation and agree with my Chinese teacher to learn Chinese for two hours every day from now on ...

In China, on 29th January, 7,700 people are infected.

 Part 2 from 30th January to 8th February - I have cabin fever

We are not allowed to open our factories on 2nd February and I sit frustrated at home. We are an active family and normally always do something sportive in our free time - but everything is closed now, even the public parks. In our friend circle we complain about the Chinese and Hong Kong people who in our opinion overreact completely. During the week I drop all my good intentions and we sit as a family most of the time in front of the PS4 playing ... which only worsens my mood because I hate nothing more than an unproductive waste of time ... but I also can't think of anything better anymore...

Out of frustration we mainly order from Burger King and McDonalds and have the food delivered to our home. Small leaflets provide information on who built the burgers for us and what body temperatures these people had.

The school informs us that it will just reopen again on March 2nd.

My wife and our security officer put a lot of work into the preparatory documentation for our factory reopening. We have to document all stays of our employees of the last 14 days without gaps and need to answer numerous health questions for everyone. Extra questions are asked as to whether the employee was in Hubei or traveled through Hubei. The office that will become the most important office for us is the Office for Work Safety in the district, which coordinates all corona-related activities from now on.

On 8th February there are 34,500 registered infections in China. I wait every day that the number of cases start decreasing because in my opinion, the precautions are massive.

Part 3 from 9th to 14th February "It starts again"

I am happy that our work life starts again. My wife and our safety officer will be checked on Sunday by the Work Safety and Health Office, that we are from 10th February allowed to work again. 18 documents were filled out, a 10cm thick stack of documents is ready. But the obviously annoyed examiners refuse us to reopen. My wife is accused of why we recklessly endanger the common safety and that we do not take the matter seriously enough – even that we prepared 5000 masks and 100kg of disinfectant. We created two isolation rooms that we had to label as “love rooms” and in the company we created a canteen for our employees with a distance of 1.5m between each of them.

Worried, my wife puts on an extra learning shift for the new security rules and makes hectic phone calls until late into the night. In the end, she convinces the local auditor to recheck us again the next morning.

In our factories in Suining, the test procedure runs on a different level - we can simply open if we have protective masks and measure the fever of each employee... and we also get approval in Shenzhen on our second attempt. So we are one of the first companies in our district in Shenzhen who re-open after the outbreak of the virus.

I make my most viewed LinkedIn post - of course about the corona situation. My key message is - the virus has no chance against China's efforts to fight the virus. And at least here it seems I am right.

At that moment, I no longer believe that it can spread to the rest of the world, and I smile about the first contact of a manager from Germany who asks me about what precautionary measures I advise him to take. My key message is - "Don't make yourself ridiculous". Today, I can only express my respect for how far-sighted he was.

For the rest of the week, we just have one focus - production production production. Since most employees are still quarantined at home, this is a difficult task.

On Friday, February 13th, I start to worry for the first time. Over 10,000 newly infected people are reported in one day, the provincial head of the Hubei government and the Wuhan mayor are released, and China sends its most experienced men, including the Shanghai mayor, as crisis managers to Wuhan. The next day, China is even stricter - many officials are afraid that if they don't take rigorous action against the virus, they will face the same fate (being released). Suining instructs all people who are not registered in Suining to immediately go to home quarantine. Our production comes again to a standstill.

Nearly 50,000 virus cases are registered in China, 500 in the rest of the world.

 Part 4 from 16th to 25th February - Live and work with the virus

Our son celebrates his 12th birthday on February 16th. Just one child is allowed to come to his "birthday party", but the guest stays for three days. Everything is a little bit different now ...

The government is tightening controls and measures. Officially, all public facilities are now closed, you have to create a health pass on your mobile phone using an app and you should use SMS to create a seamless proof of residence via the mobile operator. Without this, my mother-in-law is denied the access to the local supermarket. My Chinese teacher is no longer allowed to enter our compound. Now I have to pick her up outside the compound by car. Even the trunk of the cars are examined because there are now quarantine refugees who are being rigorously persecuted.

On February 23rd there is the first emergency with us - an employee has a fever ... I am not worried that he could have Corona - I think the safety measures are too strict and the number of cases is far too low, it is statistically simply impossible. But what happens now is just – let′s say impressive. All employees who were in a shift with him are immediately put under quarantine in a section of our factory. The employee is brought to the hospital by special transport and the tests begin at 8:30 p.m. At 1.30am there is the relieve – he has tonsillitis. Nevertheless, the factory remains closed the next day and must be completely disinfected in accordance with the public safety regulations.

I realize how easy it is to lose the control in this virus situation. Finally, I get a bad feeling ... which becomes a big worry on February 25th - Heinsberg in Germany reports its first corona case and the virus breaks out in Italy.

There are 77,700 cases in China and 2,500 in the rest of the world.

 Part 5 from 26th February to 3rd March - the global pandemic is on its way

The school is now postponing the start to March 23rd and even when we leave our compound, we are measured and scanned.

Our Vice President Haber offers a voluntary 20% salary waiver in our management group and proposes strict cost reductions, which he had already pre-discussed with our management team. I'm really touched - especially because I don't really want our employees to suffer from the situation. With a heavy heart we decide on an emergency plan, we reduce work time of the office staff to only 40%. My wife and I join the voluntary salary waiver (without reducing our working hours). I instruct our head of HR to provide financial support to employees who have issues/problems handling the situation.

On February 28th we are honored: the mayor of our Longgang district (4 million inhabitants and 388 square kilometers of size) visits our factory to honor our efforts in dealing with the crisis. We are a role model company locally, but we have not been honored so high so far. The visit is "typically Chinese" orchestrated: an inspection team arrives early in the morning to see if everything is ok. Then a five-person team visited us to pre-audit the mayor's visit. My wife receives tips on what to say and how to present ourselves and what questions to ask. In the late morning the mayor finally arrives with a big following, the whole visit is filmed by the local media. My wife is impressed by the mayor's personality – China has numerous capable people in politics.

Life is starting to normalize again - e.g. the hotels reopen in Suining. I try to convince German employees to come to China for support, but nobody follows my invitation. Numerous videos from the Internet are causing a lot of laughter - public schools have started online lessons and many teachers are unskilled with the new tools. Also, our children receive now daily to-do tasks by their teachers.

The situation in the rest of the world is escalating and the stock markets are starting to crash. I see completely black for the world - based on my own character / behavior and the reaction in my circle of German friends, I think it is impossible for the western world to get a grip on the virus. I expect that we will slide into a severe recession, perhaps even depression, if a medicine or vaccine is not found quickly.

On March 3rd the success of China's efforts can be seen, the number of infected hardly increases anymore, there are 80,400 infected in China. The crisis is taking its course in the rest of the world, there are 12,600 people infected outside of China. The international school no longer announces a date when the school restarts...

Epilogue – written 20th March - there is hope

We are in a real crisis - but in crises like this, there is nothing to complain about - you just have to accept the situation as it is and make the best out of it.

We are lucky - our production is slowly returning to normal and work from home is going well. Based on our reduced costs and despite the almost one-month loss of additional production, we will remain in the black numbers in the 1st quarter and our production is full for the next 12 weeks. In other words, we are in good spirits to survive longer than our competition - which is a good starting point ... none of our employees or acquaintances in China were infected.

The Chinese government is already starting support measures. The banks cut loan interest rates retrospectively for the entire last year with immediate effect. The district government gives us a 7,000USD grant and in Suining we receive a 40,000USD waiver.

In retroperspective, I am deeply impressed by how masterfully China has solved the problem. The rest of the world is in chaos even though China has given the world more than four weeks time. A friend tells me that he bought 250kg of pasta in Germany.

We warn all employees in Germany not to go out, wash their hands and we introduce a two-shift operation for our service - so that the risk of infection is as low as possible. The rest are sent home to the home office.

Until Chancellor Merkel′s speak, I assume that the western world can only be saved by a vaccine or a drug - and then I am surprised what measures the Western governments are ready to take. First countries declare curfews. If this sounds crazy to many - especially under the current figures - it is the only right thing to do. Most people can't grasp exponential curves until it's too late ... including me ... We have a public panic. If we don't do everything humanly possible against the virus, life will stand still until there is a cure. That would destroy the entire economy of the planet and cause millions of deaths. Doing a complete shutdown now is the right thing. And everyone must participate. Then the virus can be defeated within four weeks. China led the way. The rest of the world has a chance to get back to normal in 6 weeks if everyone now strictly quarantines. This is the only way to prevent a global disaster. Also for the "pragmatists" who say that the bigger problems are bacterial resistance, fatalities, global warming, pollution, household accidents, cancer etc. - that may be true - but we have already reacted to the virus and the economy has collapsed - we want to remain in this situation until there is a cure or we want to fight the virus now?

I keep my fingers crossed that this succeeds and that people are now - probably also against better believe – follow the quarantine regulations. Better an end with terror than an endless terror. This is exactly the choice everyone is facing now. I had no choice in China and I am happy afterwards. I was not farsighted enough to react right. I hope that my post helps a little to rethink and change some people's own behavior.

As of March 18th there is practically no virus problem in China anymore - people are starting to live again normally. The last new cases in the last two weeks in Guangdong province were only foreigners. There are over 100,000 infected worldwide.

Back to arguments and the chances in the crisis.

Almost every talk I now have, starts with sentences from the other side like “I don′t believe the Chinese numbers” or “if China really fought the virus” or “I don′t believe that China fought the virus successful” or even like "you don′t feel you make too much Chinese propaganda". I say against this – I really wonder why there were at all 80,000 (fine, now it is soon 83,000cases) cases,

I thought it would stop earlier in China.

Why? Because China reacted incredible fast. The city Wuhan was closed on 23rd January. That were two days after the first WHO-report was published. The “real” shut down in China was just from 23rd January to 10th February. Imagine, how Germany would be today, when we would have made the public shut down two days after the first case in Heinsberg, on February the 27th !!! You believe then we would have the same numbers in Germany than we now have? When Germany would have reacted on the Webasto case in January, Germany would be now without a virus symptom. But yes, afterwards is all easy – I agree – and I hope from my diary it is clearly that I openly say that I was also not reacting right or smart.

Within less than three weeks after the shutdown, China set up a well-functioning system of education, preparation, action and supervision.

And one months later the world in China is going back to normal.

Imagine, in what state your country would be, when your governments would have started precaution measurements with China. Or, worst case, with the first viruses spreading out in Germany and Italy.

Yet what happened? The governments in the rest of the world did not react for weeks. Instead, people start blaming the Chinese government that they first did not publish information or did hold them back. I am not sure, if this information would have spread in the western world faster – especially, obviously, it would have had no effect on the measurements taken. Because most of the countries did not react, even it was already clear that there is a problem.

Beginning at the end of January you can find dozens of LinkedIn posts were people write about that they feel the Western world reacts wrong. They were scanned for fever when they entered the airplane, they had to wear masks – and they arrived in a world which did not care. Still in March you could exit an airplane without any checks in Germany…

So when somebody now starts a discussion if the Chinese numbers are wrong – should you not better start a discussion why your government did not start in time any precaution measurements?

Also, not just China reacted right – also Singapore, Taiwan, Korea and Japan were able to keep the virus under control. It seems even developing countries like Thailand or Vietnam were able to take better precautions than the West – but I just have no contacts there, I just don′t know and I don′t want to make judgements just based on some articles read. So better, I just don′t talk about it…

If the numbers are right by the way I also can not say. It seems no numbers are right, there are everywhere discussions going on what are the right numbers. Yet I believe, that China was successful in the fight. Why? Because I don′t know any infected person in China. Not within our employees, not within the school our children are on, not in the families of our employees, nowhere. Yet I know already three infected people in Germany. So from my own experience I can clearly say – it looks like China has no virus problem yet Germany has…

And again, from seeing what the western world did and what China did I can just say – it is no wonder that it is like that. To react then aggressive on China I feel is a weird reaction.

Yes, you can say – it just happens because the Chinese eat wild animals and they are barbarians. Yet eating or dealing with bats etc. is also forbidden in China. And no, the Chinese are not barbarians anymore. In fact, they have not been the last 5.000 years… China is a vivid country with 1.5billion people – so it has the whole society within like every other country has. And China has a vivid and strong society which works hard to develop the country well... it is united by the will to build up a better future. That impresses me every day.

So I take the virus as natural disaster. And I can just humbly suggest that in natural disasters we should see for that we solve the situation together and not blaming each other. To start talking about that the virus is a biological weapon, no matter from the US or China, I also feel does not make sense to discuss further. We, as the “normal” people, will not be able to get the right information to really judge it so I stay better with my believe that I live in a world where this does not happen. It is so easy to look at one information and use it for two total opposite arguments.

How it will go on? It seems, that the world further divides, not just over natural borders but especially through economical and educational clusters. The Internet and the media are these days not a tool which unites people, but which separates people in their own “information worlds and believes”. And like in all crisis, it seems like it hits especially the poor people. People who have access to a good health system suffer far less from the virus. People who can afford not to work can easily ask the others to stay at home. Also, to work from home is far nicer when you have a nice home (I include myself here) then when you live in a shared flat...

We use now a lot precooked home delivery services. That would be my suggestion to restaurants - try to offer precooked packages that people easily can heat up and still can enjoy like they went to restaurant. Offer easy take-aways or organize for yourself delivery services. That booms here in China now strongly, every larger chain offers it and I just enjoyed for example a hot-pot at our home instead off at Haidilao (a famous Chinese Hot-pot-chain). This maybe one way to survive. For sure, all the home-delivery services will win and the digitalization at all. Education software, collaboration software, …

But also, the active will win. We got our production back running – with a lot of problems – but we can deliver goods where competitors don′t. So we get orders now from customers who could not order from their before partners. My suggestion - fight for your business and find ways to keep it running. Be creative, active and communicative! Then you will come better through the crisis than others. And talk.

I had so many crises in my life – I believe that the best solution is always, to tell the other side the problem and ask for help.

And try to find a way out where you both can live with – and don′t lie! That just makes everything more complicated.

Good communication is the key.

And before accusing somebody – better call him and ask him why he is doing like that. Or better inform yourself first. Or better juts don′t accuse and see for the chances.

So stay active, but stay also cautious – and then let′s fight this virus back. It is now the time to get back operational. The tools are there, there are enough countries who can be used as role models and then make the economy and society running again.

I press all my thumbs that this works out. For Germany, I hope the government starts acting more active! 

P.S.: sorry for my long writing… I see myself as a citizen of the world. I feel honored that the WirtschaftsWoche asked me for my opinion and experience in the actual situation and so it seems I have some reach – I want to use this reach to have a small push in the in my point of view right direction – which is a global world without prejudices and good, mutual cooperation and respect. Everyone is equal and I am incredible blessed, that I was born into a peaceful world and could receive a good education. Many people in the world do not receive this gift – and I feel the privileged ones should be reminded of that more often… and I feel the tools are there to fight the virus back. So please be active and start using them, push your government for action and let the world overcome the situation successfully.