Talk:COVID-19 pandemic

RfC on map of infected cases

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

There is a clear consensus to replace the "Greater China" map and that a map that lumps the PRC and Taiwan together violates NPOV. Jabo-er, the discussion starter, proposed a map of mainland China as the replacement, while Furfur proposed a map of the PRC (i.e. Mainland China + Hong Kong + Macau) ten days later. All editors who supported replacement have either expressed their view on which of the two maps they prefer, or been notified of the new option. There is slightly greater preference for the map of mainland China, though supporters of replacement generally state they are fine with either. feminist (talk) 16:39, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

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Which is better, a map of Greater China or a map of Mainland China?--Jabo-er (talk) 01:07, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Per discussions above (#Image of Map and #Greater China map), I have replaced the map of "Greater China" with one of Mainland China, and my edit got reverted. Let me explain why I think a Mainland China map is more appropriate here:

• "Mainland China" is a clearly defined and commonly used term, while "Greater China" is a vaguely defined and a less commonly used one, and not without disputes.
• "Mainland China" is itself in the table of confirmed cases, so a Mainland China map can be seen as a breakdown by first-level administrative divisions. "Greater China", as its articles suggests, is an informal term used to refer a geographic area that shares commercial and cultural ties dominated by Han Chinese. A commercial and cultural concept is not quite relevant to an article concerning a epidemic.
• If the rationale to use "Greater China" over "Mainland China" is because Taiwan is infected too, then there is no reason to exclude South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam since those countries report confirmed cases too. It would be good to have a map that shows the first-level administrative divisions of the respective countries so that we are comparing apples to apples, i.e. Incheon, South Korea: 2 compared with to Hubei, China: 1096.

User:Ratherous kept reverting my edit without ANY explanation, so I am requesting a Request for comment to avoid embroiling myself in an unwanted edit war. IMHO a Mainland China map is clearly more relevant to the ongoing epidemic outbreak.

• 
• 

--Jabo-er (talk) 00:49, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Jabo-er, you were editing without any consensus. That discussion was originally started by a sockpuppet account which was then banned, so not many people took it seriously to begin with however you did not attempt to reach any consensus whatsoever. These reasons that you are giving would be a lot more appropriate for the original discussion section rather than here. Plus I’m not sure why you keep saying i was reverting without explanation as I clearly have a very specific explanation as to why your edits were reverted. Stop edit warring to POV push and reach consensus. --Ratherous (talk) 00:55, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Maybe you can try to give your arguments rather than attacking a blocked sockpuppet. That would be more productive to the discussion. --Jabo-er (talk) 01:06, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Please note that your second map has already violated NPOV as stated in #Image of Map: Indian controlled disputed land is in exactly the color of India in that map while PRC-administrated disputed land are in a different shaded color, thus unbalanced.

For the issue you mentioned, Greater China has no such ambiguity - few people (I've never heard any) would call South Korea a part of Greater China. Please give some source about the ambiguity you mentioned. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 10:55, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree with you on the Indian controlled dispute land - the updated map is neutral on this part now. Thank you for pointing it out. On the other hand, since "Mainland China" is in the table of confirmed cases, readers can refer to a Mainland China map for a breakdown by provinces in Mainland China, where most cases are reported. A map of Mainland China + Macau + Hong Kong + Taiwan does not serve a clear purpose here, because "Greater China" is a coined term that serves economic and cultural purposes. If a map of all infected areas is expected, then a map of East Asia ( Mainland China + Macau + Hong Kong + Taiwan + Thailand + Vietnam + South Korea + Nepal) would be preferred over one excluding some countries. --Jabo-er (talk) 16:34, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

No one can explain why a map of Mainland China + Macau + Hong Kong + Taiwan (but not + Thailand + Nepal + Vietnam) makes sense. It is only here because no one else has produced a more proper one.

Sadly, I have also removed File:2019-nCoV Confirmed Cases Animated Map of China.gif, which is itself a very good animation, for violating NPOV as it depicts Taiwan as part of China rather than a claimed territory. On the other hand, counting the cases by province in Mainland but by the whole country of Taiwan is an inappropriate comparison - only the infected Taiwanese cities (Taipei, Kaohsiung; first-level administrative division in Taiwan) should be coloured.

• 

--Jabo-er (talk) 00:52, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

• FYI the reason why Mainland China + HK + Macau + TW makes more sense than Thailand + Nepal + Vietnam is the former four all claims to be China themselves, and all countries (including the UN) in the world recognize one of the four as a representative of all the four, which is part of the definition of a sovereign nation in international law. While Thailand + Nepal + Vietnam don't have that property. If you are so enthusiastic, you can actually make a map of Novorossiya + Northern Cyprus + Islamic State + Saharawi + Somaliland, but it simply doesn't make sense. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 09:56, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• • That is only true about TW. Macau and HK do not claim to be all China, only Taiwan does. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jabo-er (talk • contribs)
    • Macau and HK do claim to be China. They don't necessarily claim to be the only part of China or the representative of China. They just claim to be China. For instance, you claim to be human doesn't mean you claim to be the entire human race. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 03:58, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• How about a map of "East Asia", including the subdivisions of Chinese provinces (or other national subdivisions) depending on the data available? This would bypass the territorial NPOV issue. A viral epidemic doesn't care much about territorial claims: it's enough for one carrier to pass a border and propagate the infection. Boud (talk) 06:36, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map I would go for either a map of China broken down by province and a map of East Asia or just a map of China broken down by province. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 06:57, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

• The animated map in question does not even mention China, it is merely a colored version of an existing Wikimedia Commons map (standard/latest go-to blank province map of China) and has been restored. It took a lot of work to produce and does not make any political suggestions. prat (talk) 09:26, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Please be advised that the original map had Taiwan drawn in a different outline color. This was not visible under the previous coloring. With the new coloring (see image talk page) as requested, it is more visible. I believe this matter can now be fully put to rest. prat (talk) 11:18, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
    • Dear prat, I really appreciate the great effort that you have made in creating and updating the animation and taking actions in response to feedbacks — despite the inappropriately threatening tone in the message you left on my talk page. I hope more Wikipedians can work to resolve disputes like what you did. That said, I still propose a map of Mainland China by province or a map of East Asia would be more relevant and NPOV choices that bypass the irrelevant territorial disputes, as User:Boud suggested above, and look forward to a community consensus on this issue. --Jabo-er (talk) 14:53, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map Including Taiwan violates NPOV. Ythlev (talk) 15:14, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map remove File:2019-nCoV Confirmed Cases Animated Map of China.webm as it is POV (like why does the PRC map also show Taiwan without any explanation?) It also doesn't serve a purpose as the grouping is arbitrary. For statistical purposes, mainland China is represented separately with provincial level number. I prefer having one map of mainland China (divided by provinces) and another map of the standard world/territories with numbers in each.--DreamLinker (talk) 05:05, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• The problem is: Mainland China + HK + Macau + TW all claims to be China themselves, and all countries (including the UN) in the world recognize one of the four as a representative of all the four, which is part of the definition of a sovereign nation in international law. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 10:08, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• Thats wrong in so many different ways... At this point your contributions are starting to feel more tendentious than here to build an encyclopedia. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 12:12, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• Would you please point out in which way is that wrong? It is just a routine universal practice applied by the international communities, such as sovereign states, international organizations, etc. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 12:42, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
• Your practice, by separating all provinces of China, sounds also good. But that needs major works to be done. However, separating all provinces sounds a bit China centered, as the only other practice I've found is maps published in the US which separated all US states by treating them equal as sovereign states. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 12:46, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• Mainland China is relevant as it has the highest cases and is the origin. For the rest, a world map with country/territory is sufficient. On Wikipedia, we follow how major news reports are reporting it (like maps at [1]). The term Greater China is a political term like Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. It's not useful for defining geographical boundaries.--DreamLinker (talk) 16:38, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• @DreamLinker: All "major media" you quoted are from the western bloc, which has the tradition that media can draw their map against their governmental stance, thus doesn't reflect the fact that all governments, such as the Holy See, considers these four area the same state. Also, please kindly show any reliable source for your claim "the term Greater China is a political term like Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere". --173.68.165.114 (talk) 03:53, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• I used the map from Singaporean media which is not in the "western bloc"(which was a cold war thing anyway?). "Greater China" is a political term for a geographical area whose definition varies. Like some people consider Singapore to be part of Greater China. Others don't. Even our Wikipedia article mentions this. So there is no point in using it because (1) It is not a well defined country/territory and (2) It's geographical area is ambiguous. On the other hand, we have clear definitions of Mainland China, Macau, Hong Kong and Taiwan, which we use.--DreamLinker (talk) 02:32, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

• Mainland China is probably more relevant as long as this is mainly in PRC and Taiwan is de-facto governed separately. But I don't think either way is a big issue, if there is a better map (up to date, graphics) with or without Taiwan with a license, then inclusion or exclusion of Taiwan is a minor issue in relation to the map being up to date. I also suspect a China specific won't be relevant for long as this is spreading world wide and fast.--Eostrix (talk) 08:53, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• I wonder what the detailed Wikipedia policy about de facto governance: is Northern Cyprus included in a Greater Cyprus map? Is Islamic State drawn differently from Syria? Could you please quote the corresponding Wikipedia policy concerning this issue? --173.68.165.114 (talk) 10:08, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• I don't know if there is. But even if there is policy for geopolitical issues, I don't think it is relevant for health and epidemics. Viruses don't respect borders. We should be illustrating on a map according to what demonstrates the epidemic best. If Taiwan is part of the epidemic and illustrates the point, it should be in. But the same is true for North or South Korea. Xizang (Tibet) so far has been so far not so affected, so inclusion on the map is not so important. This is about health and people, not politics.--Eostrix (talk) 13:20, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• @Eostrix: If you really considered geopolitical issues are irrelevant, you wouldn't ask for a mainland China map instead of a greater China map, as virus doesn't care the geographic borders what's the point to exclude Taiwan from it? For North and South Korea it's a totally different issue, as both side recognize the other side to be a UN member on Sept. 17, 1991. Before that date, they were one country as recognized by the world, as all states in the world recognized one and only one of them to be the representative of Korea, until 1991. --173.68.165.114 (talk) 03:53, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Replace with map of East Asia divided down to top-level administrative regions – the underlying locus of this dispute is the political bias that is brought by the choice to use Greater China rather than Mainland China, which could imply endorsement of the PRC's territorial claims over Taiwan. Using a map of East Asia would not require that much of a zoom-out and would retain the benefit of also knowing what's happening in Taiwan. Jancarcu (talk) 20:05, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

• This whole discussion is nonsense. First, if the concern is Taiwan NPOV, then fix the reference map I reached for when creating the visualization on commons instead of hassling people who are contributing to current articles with high levels of effort. Second, it appears there is already a consensus in that design to render Taiwan differently, a difference which is visible on the current version of the animation after the colors were enhanced. Third, the map doesn't say anything about being China, it's just a square-looking area around the epicenter. The frame of reference is the caption, which currently reads "... in China" but did not yesterday. That is a quick fix. prat (talk) 20:41, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

  Can you post the map you used as a reference? Its entirely possible you just started with a bad map. You have to be careful with images on commons as they aren’t required to meet high standards of accuracy or verifiability. On a side note given that the map's title is "2019-nCoV Confirmed Cases Animated Map of China” saying that the only place "being China" is mentioned is in the caption is disingenuous. The description also states "Animated map of confirmed 2019-nCoV cases spreading across China from 2020-01-25.” Wouldn’t you have written both those things yourself? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 20:57, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

  I am sure Dear prat, a long-contributing Wikipedian and an administrator, will understand the discussion here serves the purpose of improving the article in respect of the Neutral Point of View policy. Nothing in the discussion so far is intended to undermine the contribution of you and other fellow Wikipedians either here or on Commons. First, File:China blank province map.svg is not a bad map. It's useful when showing administrative divisions in PRC's point of view with its claimed territories shown differently, but in an article of the epidemic, an NPOV and more relevant approach would be to show a map of Mainland China broken down by province, as "Mainland China" is a statistical unit of the infected cases. Second, it would be helpful if you could provide the link of such a consensus either here or on Commons for us to refer to, as the folks commenting here appear to provide some useful thoughts that can contribute to the consensus. Third, the filename "2019-nCoV Confirmed Cases Animated Map of China" is implicative, so is the fact that it's a square-looking area around the epicenter that excludes many countries. --Jabo-er (talk) 07:27, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

  Replace with map of East Asia divided down to top-level administrative regions Absolutely Agreed. Please also note that all daily statistics released by the Chinese Health commission ( http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/yqtb/list_gzbd.shtm ) also include Taiwan and those Taiwanese figures need to be excised from the China overall total which is released daily at that location. First we need a proper map though. Wikimucker (talk) 09:16, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map. Replace with: Mainland China excluding Taiwan; or replace with a map of South-East Asia, including other countries in the region. -Mardus /talk 10:17, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map Replace or relabel the map as East Asia. This prevents any unnecessary political rhetoric warring on Wikipedia. Additionally this virus has now spread well beyond China at this point with notable cases in Thailand, Vietnam, etc. Krazytea(talk) 17:23, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map with map of mainland China or broader region (i.e. East Asia). There is no such country as "Greater China" and the coupling of Taiwan with the PRC seems to be POV-pushing. Citobun (talk) 00:24, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map with map of mainland China as current map does not respect npov (for Taiwan) and is even non-POLA (for colored parts in India claimed by China). Fleet ch (talk) 09:43, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • The India part is rendered with lighter colours to show disputed territories. Being widely accepted by the Wikipedia community (see China. India, Ukraine, and Russia), it should be nowhere surprising and doesn't violate WP:POLA. Akira CA (talk) 13:03, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Keep the map with Taiwan. Taiwan is recognized as part of China by the United Nations. And apparently, Wikipedia treated Crimea as part of Ukraine in all maps, despite the fact that Crimea is not under Ukrainian control, as did in the cases of Moldova/Transnistria and Georgia/Abkhazia. We should not have double-standard here. Taekhosong (talk) 00:34, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

• UPDATE. Someone has removed the map. This is ridiculous. I have asked for the commons file to be renamed without the word 'China'. The open source code that generates the map now uses the term 'greater china regions' instead of 'province'. Can we put this political crap to bed now, please. prat (talk) 02:13, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • I have removed the 'China' mention in the caption, and in the description on both the GIF and WEBM versions of the media, and restored the animation. prat (talk)

Still has Taiwan as part of the PRC though. If you want to insist on using this map just take Taiwan out and the political crap ends immediately. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 02:36, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree. The reason why a map of PRC should be included is that it has 98.50% of current cases. If Taiwan's 0.11% of world cases should be included, it may as well be a world map.50.237.218.250 (talk) 19:01, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Incorrect. There is currently no mention of the PRC, China or any toponym whatsoever. I have again reverted someone else's caption change to yet again remove the word China. This does not assert anything and is therefore NPOV. prat (talk) 02:52, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I’m sorry but thats ridiculous, this would be *extremely* confusing to viewers. I note that there is clear consensus to make it a map of East Asia and/or a map of China, this map is neither. What is it a map of? Horse Eye Jack (talk) 05:22, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

You just intentionally side-stepped Pratyeka's argument, with nakedly bad faith that is characteristic of your "discussion" style. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 18:35, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Statue of Chiang Kai-shek on Daqiu in Wuqiu, Kinmen with a map of China

I think it's time to assume good faith. Horse Eye Jack's argument is defensible because even though the map does not mention the word "China" and has undergone stylistic adjustments to increase neutrality, the map's overall shape still looks like the chicken-shaped territory claimed by the PRC, complete with Taiwan as the second drumstick. Jancarcu (talk) 21:30, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Greater China includes the Outer Mongolia region, hence I have added a mention that the map excludes Mongolia to this page. cf. the picture of Chiang Kai-shek and his map on Wuqiu Island in Kinmen on the Greater China page. Geographyinitiative (talk) 08:53, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Without even mentioning the case of Taiwan, it is, to say the least, "surprising" to see, on this map, coloured regions on the territory of India... It's totally non-npov. Fleet ch (talk) 09:33, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Singapore is considered part of Greater China by some as well, hence it could be a valid candidate for inclusion in this map.

some analysts see the Greater China concept as a way to summarise ‘the linkages among the fair-flung international Chinese community’, thereby incorporating Singapore and overseas Chinese communities in their usage of the term (Harding 1993, 660; also see Wang 1993).[2]

Geographyinitiative (talk) 09:48, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Geographyinitiative Your statement is divorced from reality. Singapore is not considered by any reliable metric a part of the Sinosphere, let alone a part of the geographically contiguous "Greater China" bloc, which strictly refers to territories historically under the fold of the Chinese imperial state and its later republics. If Singapore is a part of the Sinosphere, then so are Malaysia and Indonesia by virtue of having large ethnic Chinese populations. Your insistence on pushing ethnonationalistic agendas on other articles has been a cause for concern with other editors, and this statement of yours does not inspire confidence in your ability to remain an NPOV editor on Wikipedia. Tiger7253 (talk) 19:06, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Replace the map with one of the People's Republic of China, showing the territory they actually control. There is no country called Greater China, and it is incredibly annoying seeing the stupid "disputed" tag on the map for more than a week. If the current map is used, "... in the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong SAR, Macau SAR and Taiwan" is a neutral discription. But an article about a disease is not the place for disputes about the political status of the island of Taiwan, neither is it the place to try to force through terminology that noone uses IRL. Wikipedia is made for its readers, not its editors. And the man on the street will refer to these areas as the PRC, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Valentinian ^{T / C} 16:11, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

• Keep map, either with caption to state "across Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan", or none at all per Pratyeka. The definition of mainland China is not contested anywhere, and its usage is mandated by relevant naming conventions. The issues with South Tibet / Arunachal Pradesh that Fleet ch are tertiary to this discussion. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 18:35, 30 January 2020 (UTC)
  • As this is the current status, there is no need to do anything. I consider this issue resolved. prat (talk) 19:46, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Replace the map This map needs to be replaced. It’s absolutely taking the political position of the PRC, and implies that Taiwan is a province. If this were a political neutral map of “Greater China”, the map should include Singapore and the Republic of China’s administrative divisions, to make it uniform with the PRC’s provinces. Taiwan/ROC does not have provinces, but instead counties and major municipal divisions that should have been included on a non-political map. It needs to be clear that the Chinese government does not and cannot represent the people of Taiwan, like some might assume with this map. Eclipsed830 (talk) 20:40, 30 January 2020 (UTC) — Eclipsed830 (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

• Replace map with map of mainland China. The reason there is a map for China next to the world map is the much higher density of cases in China, with 98.6% of all cases. The "China" concept that makes the most sense in that reasoning is the PRC-controlled "mainland China". The caption should say "mainland China"; Taiwan should be gray. (Note that China has 60 times the population of Taiwan and 1000 times as many 2019-nCoV cases.) Danstronger (talk) 00:35, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
• Replace map Current version is misleading. --Irony of prudent premise (talk) 10:31, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map Misleading and violate NPOV to include Taiwan, as is using "Greater China" since it is not a country, introducing it would be an attempt to add an extra dimension to the article where it is not needed nor appropriate. Hzh (talk) 10:48, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Summary of discussion and actions to date

A concern was raised regarding NPOV because Taiwan was not visually distinct from China in the original map. This has been resolved by changing the map colors. Taiwan is now visually distinct, as with other disputed areas. Subsequently, in addition, the following actions have been taken: remove any mention of China from the caption, remove any mention of China from the file name, remove any mention of China from the file description, rename variables and files in the generating software from 'provinces' to 'greater-china-regions'. This has been a substantial effort. The current situation is that there is no suggestion, implied or otherwise, about Taiwan's relationship to China. The true reason it is included in the current animation is simply that the map I sought on Wikimedia Commons had it included (as with other disputed areas), and that the data source had it included. I am not going to put in any more effort to remove Taiwan, since it would (a) reduce the information conveyed; and (b) waste more time. I consider this discussion concluded. Please close the RFC. prat (talk) 21:45, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

I don't understand why Arunachal Pradesh, an Indian region claimed by China, is colored in this map. It is not Mainland China, not Hong Kong, not Macau, and not Taiwan. Moreover, this light green colour does not correspond to anything in the legend. 165.225.95.70 (talk) 16:05, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm not sure what was done to make Taiwan visually distinct. It still varies by shades of pink like other provinces of the PRC. --haha169 (talk) 16:55, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

The outline was made lighter; it's a somewhat subtle difference. Jancarcu (talk) 18:29, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out, it took me a minute to see it and I knew what I was looking for. Hard to imagine that a casual observer would catch on to the fact that there are multiple countries depicted on the map. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 18:34, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Which map are you talking about? I see the animated map in the lead and the China map next to the world map on the "areas affected" section. Both maps have Taiwan colored in the same scheme as Chinese provinces. I've cleared my cache. --haha169 (talk) 21:19, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

You’re gonna laugh when you see it, [3] zoom in on Taiwan and then look at the borders (you have to zoom in, its basically impossible to see otherwise)... Taiwan’s borders are medium gray and China’s borders are dark gray. Obviously it still implies a relationship even if the border is a different shade of gray, I’m kind of at a loss at to where prat is coming from. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 22:25, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Wow, thank you for pointing that out to me. But still, the fact that the island still flashes pink at times is ridiculous; besides, the island shouldn't even be in the map in the first place. I don't think any impartial observer would consider this map to address the concerns brought up in this RfC. --haha169 (talk) 00:27, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Replace map (I am talking about the static map, the above "Summary of discussion and actions to date" is a personal summary by user:Pratyeka): I count much more "replace" than "keep". I would support a new map, without Arunachal Pradesh in India and without Taiwan. These territories can well be depicted as "claimed by the PRC" but not colorized as if they were actually party of the PRC. The current map tries to promote a biased view, which I find truely unacceptable for an epidemiological map. I could create and upload the new map. --Furfur ^{⁂ Diskussion} 09:50, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

I agree with the scoping that you laid out Furfur. Would you be able to make a map, that would be very helpful! --haha169 (talk) 19:41, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Replace map. Agreed with User:Furfur. Fleet ch (talk) 21:35, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Keep map. I don't think Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan violates NPOV, since Mainland China is defined without controversy. Peterwu2019 (talk) 15:23, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Peter, your argument doesn't make any sense. Mainland China is defined without any controversy, so why does that mean Taiwan can be included in the map without controversy? The basics of the matter is, Taiwan is included in a map of the epicenter of the disease (China) without being a part of China or having any significantly more number of cases than other neighboring East Asian countries that would merit its inclusion --haha169 (talk) 16:13, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

PRC and ROC claim each other, so including Taiwan can't be a problem, I think.. So I'm not certain. Maybe replacement can be a way to fit NPOV. But other These territorial disputes are really a problem. Welcome to share your ideas again. thanks. @Haha169 Peterwu2019 (talk) 16:18, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

"Mainland China" is also problematic because certain locations claimed by the PRC on the mainland, like Arunachal Pradesh and Aksai Chin, are actually controlled or claimed by India. Furthermore, the choice to include Taiwan could imply an important link between Taiwan and China to an inappropriate extent.Jancarcu (talk) 18:46, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Agreed, realistically the only way I can think of to make a map that fits NPOV is one that uses the boundaries of the actual controlled territories of the PRC. There are two maps that need to be changed. --haha169 (talk) 20:40, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Replace map Land area that is outside PRC control should be treated the same otherwise it is pushing a particular POV. Ozcloudwarrior (talk) 08:51, 4 February 2020 (UTC) — Ozcloudwarrior (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Number of 2019-nCoV cases

  0–9

  10–99

  100–499

  500–999

  1000–9999

  >10.000

I have uploaded a new map without Taiwan, Arunachal Pradesh and the small border areas in Himachal Pradesh, all claimed by the PRC. The map includes a new color scheme (with >10.000 cases). Please feel free to discuss it and to make suggestions for improvements. --Furfur ^{⁂ Diskussion} 22:48, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

This map looks good to me! I support replacing the current one with Fufur's map. The next question is what to do with the animated one. --haha169 (talk) 03:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Good map, I strongly support the replacement. Personally, I consider it preferable to completely remove the dashed borders of both Aksai Chin (claimed by India) and Arunachal Pradesh (claimed by China), because this information has nothing to do with the coronavirus epidemic. Fleet ch (talk) 14:58, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Support replacement with this map. It covers the areas where the PRC exercises sovereignty and not others, and so reflects the areas covered by the statistics being reported by the PRC government. I approve of the dashed lines along the lines of control in the contested areas: That is NPOV and reflects the political reality. EMS | Talk 17:17, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Very clear and informative, thank you for taking the time to improve the map. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 21:17, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Support replacement Furfur’s map reflects the real truth.Xiaoxuang (talk) 22:45, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Support replacement Furfur’s map looks good to me also, I strongly support replacing the current map with this version. 82.34.69.170 (talk) 06:05, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

 Comment:. As a Chinese mainlander,I feel quite frustrated by the comments above, although I am OK with both versions. I will not vote this time, but there is something I hope you can reconsider.

It seems most of you guys assume that the picture maker, who, as far as I know, is a quite low-key contributor who have never involved into any NPOV conflict so far in Chinese Wikipedia community, has certain intention to imply Taiwan as part of China. I am afraid of whether I will also suffer from the discrimination like here, that is, if I did something "wrong", I would be criticized by the community for something what they think I were up for, even if I am doing something with a good will, especially when you notice that I am from China.

The allegations here are not so true to me, as the notion of Greater China is like a long-time convention in Chinese Wikipedia as a way to temporarily settle down the controversy. Few really consider Singapore as part of the concept, since it is too faraway and quite different. I am skeptical about the preconception that English speakers have much more knowledge and wisdom than Chinese speakers over the issues related to China and Taiwan, two Chinese speaking regions. I hardly saw a problem like this in Chinese Wikipedia, as people in both regions have to respect each other's claims, although they disagree with each other, as one of our NPOV rules requires.

I also doubt whether this opposition of the use of Greater China could last long, as there are many Chinese contributors, who are not at all included in this talk, will still be uploading maps with the Greater China template as a convention. I do not believe English Wikipedia has people who are so knowledgeable and enthusiastic about all China-related topics that they can draw all the maps on their own, or else they might have to adapt every map related to China in case of any NPOV controversy. I believe it could be a sort of censorship if you keep removing China-related maps with the excuse of NPOV. This could hinder the knowledge sharing cross-Wikipedia.

Insisting on the point that Taiwan is totally not part of China may drag Wikipedia into the same neutrality problems that London School of Economics was facing last year over the sculpture of The World Turned Upside Down, where Taiwan and China were colored differently and there is no Palestine State. In the LSE case, students finally agree to redraw the map according to the UN's version. But you might be just lucky this time, because there is not as many Chinese students as at LSE here, but in the long run, the neutrality of Wikipedia could be undermined if we keep ignoring the thoughts and voices from Chinese-speaking communities. They have their claims and China has its own claims like India and Taiwan, which should not be a truth too hard to be respected.

Sorry, I cannot make really quick response here, as I will be busy these days. Hope you can read this through and consider my humble two bits. --34Unionist (talk) 17:11, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

You misremember the The World Turned Upside Down (sculpture) conflict, LSE decided not to alter the colors of countries on the globe and added an asterick and a plaque to explain the conflict. I think you will find if you look at reliable reports of the incident that the attempt by Chinese students (who were opposed by students of all nationalities, not just Taiwanese) at LSE to quash artistic freedom is remembered as an example of overseas censorship of Chinese issues. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 18:18, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

@34Unionist: There are two things wrong with the original map that has been identified that really should not be controversial at all. First -- the fact that Arunachal Pradesh is colored is confusing to an average viewer on the first glance. This is not a question of China's land borders, it is a simple fact that Arunachal Pradesh did not report any cases on the state level, so any color is misleading. The new map that Furfur created acknowledged the disputed territory using a dashed line, so this is NPOV.

Secondly, regarding Taiwan. There is no land border so it is difficult to fix the problem the same way as above by using dashed lines. However, the fact remains that the coronavirus has up to now been primarily an epidemic in Mainland China and not in Taiwan. So from a scoping perspective, there is no good reason to include Taiwan.

原图有两个主要错误，实际上根本不应该引起争议。首先，原图中的阿鲁纳恰尔邦是黄色的，意味着阿鲁纳恰尔邦报告了州／省一级的病毒病例数据，实际上没有这种事，因此任何颜色都具有误导性。Fufur提供的新地图使用虚线确认了有争议的领土，这就复合了NPOV规定。第二，台湾这个问题。大陆和台湾中间没有陆地边界，因此很难通过虚线以与上述相同的方式解决。但是，新型冠状病毒到目前为止主要是在中国大陆的流行病，而在台湾目前还是控制住了。因此，从范围界定的角度来看，真的没有好理由把台湾包括在内。--haha169 (talk) 22:44, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Haha169: I agree that if I am to draw such a map, I will try to be less controversial as possible, but this does not mean that I can ask others to comply with my rules and more importantly, this also does not mean that if they do not comply with what I believe, they have some "unpleasant/hideous" intention, which is a serious accusation that could be discriminative against those from China and related regions. I 100% agree with Furfur's proposal but I just feel uncomfortable about the implication about "some intention" behind the map.

Second, I said I am OK with both maps, but I doubt English Wikipedia community can continuously rule out the Greater China maps, as they are widely used in and beyond Wikipedia. Also, in this article, a great number of figures are made by Chinese Wikipedia users. Assuming they have some intention and rejecting their figures also blocks the information sharing cross-Wikipedia. Not many English users can read Chinese papers and websites and make enough maps to replace the Greater China maps. Rejecting Greater China maps is fundamentally a censorship that blocks free expression. Also, please note that in the original map, the color of controversial land is already different from the color of Chinese provinces. Nobody disrespects Indian or Taiwanese claims, so both the lands are separate from Chinese provinces, rather than, as China claims, part of some province, or else there should be no different colors and no McMahon Line that China does not admit at all.

Third, NPOV is not a censorship that restricts free speech of the people. So, this is why we even allows pseudoscience and fringe theories that are hated by many to have an entry, where we also describe their controversies. About this, thanks for Horse Eye Jack pointing out my mistake about LSE, we can also describe the controversy with an ariel sticker. I think using different colored, and drawing borders that China does not admit already make the map neutral enough, unless the community wants to hold further stances over the ambiguity of ownerships, which in Chinese Wikipedia, we have a clear rule to remain silent on. I really doubt the idea you think you are wiser and more knowledgeable than the Chinese community about these issues and can make a decision for them about their countries. We can solve this problem with an ariel sticker, possibly more explanation, instead of censorship, so why do we need to pretend to have made a decision for an issue that is unsettled and highly controversial?34Unionist (talk) 03:53, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Furfur's picture successfully solved the first problem (territorial disputes with India). The main problem is whether Taiwan and mainland should be seen as a whole. In this epidemic, Taiwan can't be the part of epicenter, so the important point is whether it should be put alongside with mainland, Hong Kong and Macau. Considering the epicenter, it should be a map showing mainland China, and that's my suggestion. Peterwu2019 (talk) 03:07, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• @Ythlev, DreamLinker, Mardus, Krazytea, Citobun, Valentinian, Danstronger, and Hzh: Do you support a map of mainland China or a map of the People's Republic of China (i.e. mainland China + SARs)? feminist (talk) 03:23, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

No strong preference between the two, but leaning toward replacing with a map of mainland China, since the numbers for HK and Macau are reported separately, by separate governments, and are shown separately in the table of cases that appears beside the maps. Citobun (talk) 04:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Lean towards PRC, including the SARs, in which case the caption can simply say "2019-nCoV cases in China". (I hadn't realized "mainland China" excludes the SARs.) Incidentally, I would love to see this map replaced as soon as possible, regardless of how these details are decided. The current pink Taiwan, convoluted caption, and disputed tag are an eyesore, and the consensus for "replace" above seems very strong. Danstronger (talk) 04:27, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree. Replacement has already been a consensus, so it should be enforced. Peterwu2019 (talk) 05:28, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

I am not against the consensus here, instead I am happy that you can have discussion over the long-debating issue. But I just want to remind you that hate, conjecture of an evil plot, or any other kind of personal feelings should not be used an excuse to rule out other opinions or expressions. Everything could be an eyesore, including Israel to Muslim radicals, but here in Wikipedia, we should have tolerance to these eyesores no matter whether we like it or not. As far as I am concerned, any act to ignore them will not last long. The point I make here is that the original map should be tolerated, although not the best. Also, to remind Furfur (talk · contribs), please color Hong Kong and Macao gray, if you are to draw a map of mainland China.--34Unionist (talk) 08:26, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

I have tried my best to avoid what you say, and really, after the discussion, I changed my mind. It's our pride to make here better. Thank you. Peterwu2019 (talk) 08:54, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Actually I thought about this a bit more and changed my mind: I think excluding the SARs and saying "mainland China" is probably best. Taking a closer look at how NPOV principle is implemented in the first paragraph and first map of China, it seems the most elegant and NPOV thing to do here is to just say "mainland China" and exclude the SARs, so we have a map of a relatively well-defined area. (I also agree with Citobun's argument above.) Danstronger (talk) 14:29, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

I prefer a map of Mainland China (excluding the 2 SARs) as it is the most relevant here. The outbreak is centred in Mainland China and the reporting authority of provincial level data, is actually responsible for the mainland provinces (and not the SARs, whose data is reported by their respective authorities). Restricting it to Mainland China and provincial level numbers is consistent with the data source and also avoids any NPOV problems.--DreamLinker (talk) 08:31, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't see any issue with either mainland China or PRC. The concern is about including Taiwan, not Hong Kong or Macao, which are not particularly noticeable. The one presented here where Taiwan is greyed-out is acceptable. Hzh (talk) 09:43, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Repalce the "Greater China" one with "mainland China" Also to remind that excluding Taiwan from China threatens NPOV to the same extent as including it, English Wikipedia should adopt a principle of keeping silent on this (like Chinese Wikipedia) to avoid related disputes. Also, @Furfur: I personally prefer the color scheme of 董辰兴's map (current map). Akira CA (talk) 10:54, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• The map can include the Taiwan cases whether or not Taiwan is independent country.--hoising (talk) 06:09, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• Per response request by @Feminist:: Replace with Mainland China only, per arguments by User:Citobun. Additional maps may be created, that would include all the countries and territories in the map. -Mardus /talk 15:35, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Further clarification about animated map depicting Greater China

The RfC was concluded with saying that There is a clear consensus to replace the "Greater China" map and that a map that lumps the PRC and Taiwan together violates NPOV. However another version of the map exists in the infobox which does the same (lumping Taiwan along with Mainland China, HK, Macau and reporting for all). I removed the map, but was reverted saying "RfC on map of infected cases" is not about the animated map, which already rendered Taiwan differently and treated China-controlled Aksai Chin & India-controlled Arunachal Pradesh equally for NPOV. Any queries plz launch another RfC". Actually this is not true, because Taiwan is not rendered separately and the data for Taiwan is reported alongside Chinese provincial level data. I would request User:Feminist to clarify this point about the closure.--DreamLinker (talk) 08:40, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

It is, compare it with Hainan and you'll see the difference, the color and the border line are diluted. Actually this has been done twice! Please be advised that the original map had Taiwan drawn in a different outline color. This was not visible under the previous coloring. With the new coloring (see image talk page) as requested, it is more visible. I believe this matter can now be fully put to rest. Akira CA (talk) 09:42, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

As was discussed above by multiple editors the difference is between light and dark grey outlines and can only be discerned when an editor has booth zoomed in and been informed about what exactly to look for. For functional purposes both maps have the exact same NPOV issue. You appear to be beating a dead horse. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 10:41, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

While the RfC was not started with a focus on the animated map, consensus exists that a map combining the PRC and Taiwan but not including other territories is inappropriate on this article. Absent any consensus that the animated map depicting Greater China should be an exception to this rule, the animated map should be removed. Any editors wishing for the animated Greater China map to be reinstated may start a new discussion to seek consensus to do so. feminist (talk) 09:06, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

@Feminist: The consensus to replace the Greater China map with a Mainland China one doesn't apply straightforward to delete the animated map. While the Greater China map treats Taiwan exactly the same like Hainan Province (which violates the NPOV I assume), the animated map by User:Pratyeka has already rendered Taiwan to make it visually distinct. Moreover, it treats China-controlled Aksai Chin & India-controlled Arunachal Pradesh equally (with grey color doesn't change with Tibet/Xinjiang) so does not violates NPOV. Deleting the map need consensus, not keeping it. Quoting the consensus on replacing another map to delete this much more NPOV map sounds like slippery slope. Akira CA (talk) 09:29, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

No, there does not exist a consensus to replace the Greater China map with a Mainland China one. There is a consensus to replace the Greater China map with something else (either the PRC map or the mainland China map). Those who supported replacement almost universally supported their !vote by noting that a map combining Taiwan with the PRC violates NPOV. In other words, there exists consensus that a map combining Taiwan with the PRC violates NPOV. feminist (talk) 09:38, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely no, it's not about a map combining Taiwan with the PRC violates NPOV but taking the political position of the PRC, and implies that Taiwan is a province and imposing the identity of "Greater China" on Taiwanese people. With the rendered Taiwan in this animated map there is no such concern. Indeed The animated map in question does not even mention China. The NPOV disputes on South Tibet/Arunachal Pradesh is also resolved. It is much more beneficial to include this informative yet NPOV animation in the article than removing it. Akira CA (talk)

The purpose of this discussion is to determine the consensus reached within the RfC and whether it applies to the animated map, not to re-litigate whether the map is appropriate or not. feminist (talk) 10:06, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

The ultimate purpose of the consensus is to determine whether the map is appropriate or not, so if there is a good reason to include it why not? Akira CA (talk) 10:36, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

In addition, although the focus of the RfC was not the animated map, among those who discussed it, there exists consensus (between Jabo-er, Horse Eye Jack, DreamLinker, Fleet ch, Geographyinitiative, and Haha169) that it violates NPOV, versus those who think it does not (Pratyeka and Akira CA). feminist (talk) 09:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

False, CaradhrasAiguo, Taekhosong, 173.68.165.114 also think it does not, and some of Geographyinitiative's argument is considered to be divorced from reality by Tiger7253. Akira CA (talk) 09:58, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Hence I noted this as "in addition" to the consensus already reached that a map combining figures from the PRC and Taiwan, or one that highlights PRC subdivisions but not Taiwan's, violates NPOV. None of the three editors you mentioned make any express reference to the animated map, so their opinions are no more relevant in this context than those who supported replacement of the static map but did not comment on the animated map. feminist (talk) 10:06, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

@Akira CA: I've started a thread at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard#2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak to attempt resolving the dispute. feminist (talk) 10:01, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. Akira CA (talk) 10:08, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

On a separate note, the animated map is neither NPOV nor factually correct. Some points regarding the map. It is important to remember that the map is showing data reported by PRC (Source data for map [4])

1. Aksai Chin is greyed out which is incorrect. Sure, it is disputed by India, however the territory is actually under PRC control and they are correctly reporting data for it. The map should reflect the cases in that region. It should be coloured (the disputed border should be shown using dotted lines. However the territory should not be greyed out)
2. Arunachal Pradesh is greyed out and disputed borders shown using dotted lines (which is correct because it is disputed territory not under PRC control and so PRC cannot report data from Arunachal Pradesh)
3. Taiwan is coloured which is incorrect. It should be greyed out since it is disputed territory not under PRC control and PRC cannot report data from there. (Usingh [5] as the source data for Taiwan is incorrect)

The issue here is not only NPOV, but also the factual issue of the data. In any case, the consensus in the RfC was clear that a map grouping Taiwan with PRC violates NPOV for this article.--DreamLinker (talk) 10:35, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Your claims fails completely as the source of the map is not published by the PRC government but a non governmental organization. It also publishes international cases so PRC cannot report data from there doesn't matter. Akira CA (talk) 10:47, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I see no indication that DXY.cn is a NGO. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 11:00, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Non-governmental organizations (also known as NGOs, nongovernmental organizations, or nongovernment organizations) are organizations independent of any government. And there is no indication of any link with any government here DXY.cn. Akira CA (talk) 11:21, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I pointed out multiple issues with the map which did you didn't address so my claims don't "completely fail". Oh it seems DXY.cn is an online community of Physicians in mainland China, (not Taiwan) and it is partially owned by Tencent. In any case this means the reliability of the data is questionable since it is not even coming from the government. All the more reason to remove this map as it is not reliable then.--DreamLinker (talk) 12:03, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

1. The replies for NPOV are on below. 2. Why owned by Tencent make the data questionable? Are you imposing a biased view towards mainland Chinese Physician community? They simply look up news for updating their numbers, not much difference from BNO news. Whatever, shall we use WHO situation reports? Akira CA (talk) 12:13, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

To talk about NPOV, I've already said it's not about a map combining Taiwan with the PRC violates NPOV but taking the political position of the PRC, and implies that Taiwan is a province and imposing the identity of "Greater China" on Taiwanese people., and yet this map does not even mention China. PRC + Taiwan clearly implies Taiwan is apart from PRC, how could it threaten NPOV? Akira CA (talk) 10:51, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

If you have questions about NPOV review the section above this one, the NPOV issue is certainly well addressed and a consensus has been reached on it. You might also consider reading WP:NPOV so you have a better understanding of what wikipedia means by neutral point of view. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 10:56, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

And what I am quoting—taking the political position of the PRC, and implies that Taiwan is a province—was from the discussion above and yet this map is not doing so as it does not even mention China. Also, if you don't have the ability to quote what wikipedia means by neutral point of view and illustrate the problem in my interpretation, it's better for you not to mention it. Akira CA (talk) 11:12, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Additions to Response section

@FobTown: Not sure what you're trying to do with transplanting information from other sections. Calling a section #Propaganda is not NPOV. As #Censorship is a government tactic being used, it's been placed under management for relevancy. You're welcome to suggest alternatives here, but as your first edit to create such a section was reverted, this needs to be established in Talk first. Sleath56 (talk) 01:33, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: I've undone your edits. While I appreciate that you've (potentially) noted my previous comment and took heed to organize your edits under the already established sections, you're encouraged to converse on Talk when these issues arise, not just read. The problem extends however with the specific entries you've tried to insert for the third time now. The particular sources you've used have both been questioned enough at RSP12 for them to be used them as the sole source for any authoritative statements. Beyond that, even by the standards of utilizing them to the merit of statements of opinions, they are far below the bar in satisfying WP:UNDUE to include them without other more mainline sources stating the same views. As I've said earlier, you're welcome to suggest proposals on how to extend those sections, or any others, but this must be done with interacting with discussions on Talk. Sleath56 (talk) 20:21, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

This content is of much interest, and can be worked on further with more mainstream sources. At the same time there is nothing wrong with these sources when reporting events that have happened. FobTown (talk) 21:30, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

If the content is of interest, then you're encouraged to find more RS that back up those statements such that they satisfy concerns of fringe as has been brought up above. The information you've added are not "reporting events," but statements of opinion. With those, they've been undone by me earlier because they do not satisfy WP:UNDUE, which is that "If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small minority, it does not belong on Wikipedia, regardless of whether it is true or you can prove it, except perhaps in some ancillary article." As has been said, you're welcome to suggest proposals, but do so through talk instead of attempting to re-enter the same edits. Sleath56 (talk) 01:54, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: It's been noticed that you've re-entered your entry 4 minutes after it's been undone, without even an edit summary comment. I've not sure what you're trying to do as you've already been previously invited to participate here. Establish your suggested proposals here, especially when they are being held as points of contention, which have already been cited above and are currently unanswered.Sleath56 (talk) 04:15, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Added citations from Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. As long as we are reporting events that happened and quoting experts with proper sources, it isn't controversial and is permitted to go into the article directly. BTW, saying "you're welcome to suggest proposals on how to extend those sections, or any others, but this must be done with interacting with discussions on Talk" can be construed as a stalling tactic or even censorship. FobTown (talk) 04:51, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

You can construe it what you like, "stalling tactic" or "censorship." I call it the peer review process of establishing WP:CONSENSUS. You’ve been warned for edit warring in the past, so the courtesy as has been reflected onto you throughout this discussion that would be to reciprocate AGF in kind should be clear.

In the concerns that I’ve brought up, that of WP:UNDUE, which is that "If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small minority, it does not belong on Wikipedia, regardless of whether it is true or you can prove it, except perhaps in some ancillary article”. that has not been satisfied. Furthermore, there are NPOV concerns of WP:IMPARTIAL that are unaddressed.

The point of Talk is to establish consensus when issues between editors are brought up. A point of contention brought against your edit doesn’t mean they cannot exist in the article, but that they require work through discussion. Your repeated attempts to re-enter the same desired phrasing when other editors have tried to adjust are not constructive to reaching that regard. Sleath56 (talk) 05:15, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Continued discussion carried from #Criticism section for continuity below
• ================ Sleath56 (talk) 00:12, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Instead of claiming wp:undue how about just letting it grow and move it to own page, and trim and summarize? Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 06:10, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Daniel.Cardenas: Which is precisely what has been done. The section has been trimmed and summarized once I determined the independent initiative for that regard was not present, with material more suitable for other sections moved accordingly. See #Reactions to Response. You're welcome to review it as it now compared to its state before: here and share your thoughts, as I believe only a WP:DRR/3 is going to resolve the matter. Sleath56 (talk) 22:32, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

See how big it grows, and we could consider this plan of action.

I noticed that Sleath56 is strategically deleting content regarding Xi Xinping's media directive even if citing by WSJ and NYT and Washington Post, while leaving in isolated media incidents, all without getting consensus for their removal. FobTown (talk) 19:53, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: It appears you missed my comment below, and if you are going to invoke someone's name, it's a common courtesy to ping them.

As I said, you can construe it what you like, "stalling tactic" or "censorship." I call it the peer review process of establishing WP:CONSENSUS, one of the WP:5P of this site. Wikipedia is not your personal essay, when you encounter objections to your entry, you are expected to participate in discussion on Talk, which is designed for constructive dialogue, not blithely snide remarks at your fellow editors with no suggestions of how to revise the entries per concerns. You’ve been warned for edit warring in the past, so the courtesy as has been reflected onto you throughout this discussion that would be to reciprocate AGF in kind should be clear.

The point of Talk is to establish consensus when issues between editors are brought up. A point of contention brought against your edit doesn’t mean they cannot exist in the article, but that they require work through discussion. The courtesy of editorial dialogue is to allow the individual editor to adjust their own entries as they know their source best. Contrary to your personal belief on being 'stalled,' I've trimmed your entries which still are extant after repeated requests for you to do so yourself were ignored. Your repeated attempts to re-enter the same desired phrasing when other editors have tried to adjust are not constructive to reaching that regard.

Sleath56 (talk) 05:15, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• @FobTown: A conjecture by an adjunct professor is neither notable enough nor does it fit insertion into that passage and appears to be editorializing. If you contest the revision of "Willy Lam of the Chinese University of Hong Kong's Center for China Studies said "Li was selected for political reasons. If the situation deteriorated further, Li would have to take the blame. Compared to SARS, (then-President) Hu Jintao visited a few places severely affected by SARS, but Xi is now staying safely in Beijing.", you're welcome to offer your explanation as to why. Sleath56 (talk) 02:50, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Additionally, since you've reverted a trimming edit by another editor, you need to explain why your original entry follows guidelines. "Since then state media has been redirecting public anger of mishandling of the initial outbreak and concerns over the lockdown away from Xi Jinping and towards provincial-level authorities, and have been publishing "gushing reports on Beijing’s response" to the epidemic to counteract criticism" This is a duplication of the same allegations already in #Criticism of local response. Not to mention that the phrasing you've entered does not satisfy basic editorial NPOV: Avoid stating opinions as facts. Usually, articles will contain information about the significant opinions that have been expressed about their subjects. However, these opinions should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice. Rather, they should be attributed in the text to particular sources, or where justified, described as widespread views, etc. For example, an article should not state that "genocide is an evil action", but it may state that "genocide has been described by John So-and-so as the epitome of human evil."
• Furthermore, "including extensive coverage of the new hospital under construction in Wuhan using images of another already-completed building." is not WP:PROPORTION to the other heavy handed measures by the central government. Unless the doctoring of photos to establish calm is a regular established government policy in handling this epidemic, one incident is not notable as a charge. Sleath56 (talk) 03:01, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• @FobTown: For your reverts at: "Tsinghua University's Qiang also echoed this sentiment, pointing out that the Wuhan government did not have the power to act decisively because they were at the bottom of the chain of command, saying “everyone — from the central government to the local government to the bureaucracy to the party to the military — was waiting for orders from the ‘supreme leader’ [Xi Jinping] before acting”.[382]"

• You must have noticed that I've already incorporated it into the preceding paragraph on repetitious grounds. "Critics, such as Wu Qiang, a former professor at Tsinghua University and Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at the University of London, have further argued this with the latter suggesting that it was also exacerbated through local officials being "apprehensive about taking sensible preventive measures without knowing what Xi and other top leaders wanted as they feared that any missteps would have serious political consequences" As other RS have said, these suggestions are only held by some "sections of the international media," so I'm not sure what your argument is in regards to WP:PROPORTION for expanding it to such a degree.

• This statement: "Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at SOAS University of London, who argued that Xi's enhanced censorship and propaganda system contributed to the crisis, observed that the party's progapanda machinery went into "overdrive" to shape public opinion and protect Xi's reputation, noting that Xi's declaration coincided with the central government's ramped-up response that was widely publicized.[270][271][272]" has already been moved, which you seem to acquiesce since the moved portion has not been deleted. This is clearly duplicative entries, so I'm not sure what the point of order is that you hold for continually re-applying it. Sleath56 (talk) 07:09, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

I felt that Steve Tsang's original "overdrive" quote was significantly watered down in your revision, and the original version of his quote goes under the Censorship and Police Response section which is meant to cover the central government, as opposed to the Criticism of Local Response" that covers provincial and city authorities. There would be some duplication between the two sections, but Tsang should be mentioned in both. FobTown (talk) 22:36, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: Appreciate the response and noting the concerns of the other points made above. My view is this: (though I'm certainly open to suggestions in kind) which is that while I think he is notable enough to be expanded per your considerations, I feel it's not something that needs to be recycled in duplicate to other sections. I would support your suggestion of reorganizing the "Censorship and Police Response section" to hone in on central government tactics and reactions, as I also feel the two sections are getting messy in clarity of what goes where. Nonetheless, in any case, I've expanded his statement further to include: a sentiment that Tsang argued was difficult to avoid when "power is concentrated in the hands of one top leader who is punitive to those who make mistakes". Sleath56 (talk) 00:32, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Quite a few international sources have noticed a two-pronged strategy on part of Beijing, one is the censoring negative news, the other is highlighting Beijing's positive steps. The new hospital coverage is a good instance of the latter. I this belongs more in Censorship and Police Response rather than Criticism of Local Response.

International sources have also noted existing censorship controls in place back in December 2019 during the initial outbreak phase, so I preceded Xi Xinping's comments with such mention in Censorship and Police Response. FobTown (talk) 22:36, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: I've missed your comment here. The concern I have isn't that the assumed tactics of the government shouldn't be represented in appropriate sections as they do, but that they deserve notable examples that fit with WP:PROPORTION magnitude of the other entries in the section. If you're interested in expanding that subject, I'd encourage you to find more demonstrative citations of it than an seemingly isolated incident of plastering inaccurate photos for something that only took 10 days to construct. In any case, I've trimmed the section again. As with Steve Tsang, he is not a lone voice (or else I would have opposed allowing his entry at any area on the article on WP:UNDUE) and if you want to highlight the points he made, there are plenty of other voices who satisfy notability to merit inclusion as a substitute. This page is not a personal essay on Steve Tsang, and I oppose representing one single person's views as much as his additional inclusion on #Censorship along with #Response would merit. Sleath56 (talk) 04:29, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: Your entry on Li Keqiang appointment was removed. The reason this has been continually removed is because #Domestic Response is solely reporting actions done, not explanatory third-party opinion statements on them. The governmental explanation on why he was appointed has been omitted, so observer analyses would likewise clearly not fit in this section either. Take it elsewhere if desired.

I've cited NPOV concerns for a while, and the style of your entries have me assume that you aren't quite aware of WP:IMPARTIAL: Wikipedia describes disputes. Wikipedia does not engage in disputes. A neutral characterization of disputes requires presenting viewpoints with a consistently impartial tone; otherwise articles end up as partisan commentaries even while presenting all relevant points of view. Even where a topic is presented in terms of facts rather than opinions, inappropriate tone can be introduced through the way in which facts are selected, presented, or organized. Neutral articles are written with a tone that provides an unbiased, accurate, and proportionate representation of all positions included in the article..

As a policy of WP:NPOV, this is "non-negotiable." We do not speak for RS, they must speak for themselves, if proportional and due. Do not remove 'whom attribution' requests unless you're clarifying them. Do not revert edits by other editors who rework your entries to make them fit impartiality, unless you yourself are adjusting them further towards that regard. Sleath56 (talk) 06:03, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Agreed, don't need as much direct quoting from Steve Tsang, as the Washington Post described the party as circling protective wagons around President Xi.

In expanding the state media's spotlight on the central government's all out efforts, the hospital construction is cited as an example. The Lunar New Year's Eve is also another example of the state media's selective coverage to promote or marginalize topics, although slightly out of chronological order.

Agreed, Li Keqiang's appointment is now mentioned on the separate page. FobTown (talk) 14:59, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: Appreciate the agreement on direct quoting and the appointment entry. I think the problem with that statement example on state media is that they aren't very proportional compared to the reports of detainments and outright censorships in the same section. I'd encourage you to find due examples if you desire to maintain that entry, but as is, I don't see the merit of including that passage when it's already been summed in sentiment in #Reactions to prevention efforts:

Notable in relation to the widespread criticism of the local response, the central government's response has been contrasted with praise for their handling of the crisis by international experts,[360] but also especially by state media.[361] This has led to suggestions, in particular by the international media, that it is an attempt by the official press to shift public anger away from the central government and towards local authorities.[362] It has been noted historically that the tendency of provincial governments to minimise reporting local incidents have been because of the central government directing a large proportion of the blame onto them.[363]

On another note, do not revert edits by other editors who rework sentence and word structure on grounds of impartiality. The section now has many more editors than you or me contributing who have reworked the flow to be reverted in this manner. Sleath56 (talk) 18:20, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

I would still mention it in both sections, albeit in a different form. Particularly both state media praise and content moderators who block banned content are covered side-by-side in international media articles discussing the overall way that China's information operates, basically propaganda and censorship go hand-in-hand (perhaps re-title that section to Censorship and Propaganda?). The Lunar New Year's Eve gala is also another example of the state media's selective coverage to promote or marginalize topics, so this constitutes another example of censorship. The Criticism of Local Response touches a bit on censorship and state media which is fine, but the real meat and potatoes part is the central gov't and local gov't power dynamic. FobTown (talk) 21:53, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: Reworked it once again, trimming some. This included the opinions on the lockdowns, both praise and concerns, which is not relevant to a section on #Censorship. The subsection is becoming almost as big as its parent section, which has been due to bloat.

The entry on positive coverage in the media has been precisely trimmed to "As part of the central government's "bifurcated approach to diffuse discontent", citizens were permitted to criticize local officials so long as they did not "question the basic legitimacy of the party", while the propaganda machinery was going into "overdrive...to protect [Xi Jinping's] reputation" through positive press coverage in the state media." This is enough when it's essentially a duplication of what's been covered in the #Criticism section. You also need to refrain from rearranging paragraphs which is disrupting the chronological order. Sleath56 (talk) 18:15, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

It is not duplicated, as the few specific examples of state media coverage are in "Censorship and Police Response" but not in "Criticism of Local Response". That is why I feel that your precise trimming in "Censorship and Police Response" actually obfuscates that point.

Chronological order might not be perfect, but it flows quite a bit better. FobTown (talk) 19:51, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: Missed your comment. Appreciate the response. The problem I've repeated cited that I had is that the cited examples and entries you post are all too secondary-hand of accusations. The priority is citing primary sources, eg. the government, themselves in this section, not listing all the known grievances published by semi-notable on the internet. I've found a better source here which directly cites Xi Jinping on his expectations of press coverage that is much more suitable, and should also satisfy your suggestion. 1 These kind of citations are what I hold to be appropriate for the section, and that I encourage you to find more of yourself if you're interested in expanding the section.

On chronology:Arrangement by chronological order is a clean way of displaying entries especially for current events, and also how we prevent editorialized re-arranging of paragraphs by editors that lead to easy-to-avoid edit wars which can be avoided otherwise by adopting the former. That's why chronological ordering is appropriate and why changing it is to be avoided. Sleath56 (talk) 20:24, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to including the Quartz viewpoint on why Xi Jinping wants to create positive coverage, but that should be taken with a grain of salt rather than being considered a suitable replacement for NYT, CNN, National Post, etc. And you can't just remove a source on claims of undue weight. The National Post article I added particularly illustrates the effective of what the state media coverage has done, with the publicized lock down of Wuhan awing observers while actually being too late to be effective. FobTown (talk) 20:39, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

As the Quartz has not been cited on WP:RSP, its utility in this instance to provide an English translation of a cited Xinhua quotation is an appropriate case of use. The problem I hold with the lockdown entry isn't on the RS or grounds of WP:UNDUE. I've checked the NP article and its a bare-bones summary on the outbreak. There is no relevance for it to this section on censorship. Sleath56 (talk) 20:58, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Second hand versus primary sources...then obviously the government is not going to announce how/when their censorship policy/filter works. In that case we have the second hand sources reporting all of the incidents and then it is possible to see a narrative of how censorship is working.

Interestingly the Xinhua quotation from Quartz actually sums up what the authorities were aiming for, with the rapid hospital construction promoted front and center in National Post, NYT, CNN, Vice, etc., so that allows me to expand that paragraph considerably. We could have a separate header for propoganda, but instead I suggest expanding the section to the new title of "Censorship, propoganda, and police respose", as the stated aim of the Xinhua quote was to guide the way people think. And you guide peoples' thinking in two ways, by promoting the topics tht gov't wants heard (i.e. hospital is almost done, lockdown) and hiding topics the gov't doesn't want (criticism of handling of epidemic). FobTown (talk) 04:33, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Besides the title change to "Censorship, propoganda, and police respose", promote it to heading Tier 3 so it is no longer a subsection of "Domestic Response". FobTown (talk) 04:34, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@FobTown: First, let me clarify that secondary sources are what Wikipedia must rely on over primary sources, as the latter would mean interpreting the statement yourself, which is WP:OR. The meaning in what I said above is that the context of the Quartz in framing Xi Jinping's statement as a call for positive media coverage is a more precise means to utilize secondary sources, than outright quoting the secondary source itself. Thus allowing for a concise entry which allows a highlight of the key point which is Xi Jinping's statement 'indicting himself':

Those allegations were highlighted by a statement from Xi Jinping on 3 February declaring the need for an emphasis by state media on "telling the moving stories of how [people] on the front line are preventing and fighting the virus," as a priority of coverage.

Second, I've accepted many of the points you've made on the premise of "positive coverage" such that I believe it is relevant to the topic of censorship. However, the underlying point of an encyclopedia here which is WP:NOTEVERYTHING "A Wikipedia article should not be a complete exposition of all possible details, but a summary of accepted knowledge regarding its subject." While positive coverage is a part of it, the clear majority focus of RS is on the actual censorship and police actions. Incidents like the detainment of a citizen in Tianjin are very notable examples of this that have become diluted because of the scope of the section. I think what has already been said about positive coverage is a satisfactory enough summary and that WP:PROPORTION should be brought in mind here. The section is on Censorship and Police response, but there is very little on police response and I oppose further expanding it when there is such a lack of latter entries at the present. The focus should be to summarize the CCP's tactics and highlight the egregious that have been reported by RS such as the revelations of police incidents of detainments and other police actions, which haven't been covered almost at all despite the section being dedicated half towards police response. Sleath56 (talk) 09:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Of course we should attribute to the journalist to avoid any allegation of WP:OR.

While the section is currently titled "Censorship and Police response", don't let that restrict what content can go in there. In fact the state media's efforts to control the story, although not part of that section title, actually has been covered as much or even more than police response by many international observers which are RS, so in that case the title is more appropriately "Censorship and propaganda". State media's positive coverage was only briefly mentioned in "Criticism of local response", but missing commonly cited examples and also missing the impact upon domestic and foreign observers, so its not really a duplication. Furthermore, "criticism of local response" is quite limited in scope and doesn't allow scrutiny of central government actions. FobTown (talk) 23:13, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Support “2019-20 Novel coronavirus 2019-nCoV outbreak” or the proposed title rather than any title using “Wuhan”. Any list of the diseases where the WHO-adopted name uses a location simply makes WHO’s current position (to avoid using places in the common name of new diseases) clearly the wise position. (Who wants to go see the Ebola River next spring?) I support being part of the group of media outlets and content publishers who follow WHO’s lead rather than part of the group who perpetuates a problematic convention. I likewise oppose dropping “outbreak” from this page title. There is a page for the virus itself already, and this page is about the current outbreak. Should it become a pandemic, there can be a new discussion and the page can be moved to a title that reflects that new consensus. Mkettleson (talk) 15:38, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Support — I googled “novel coronavirus outbreak” and no wikipedia article made the first page of results, although multiple WHO and CDC articles did. This article should be findable on search engines by folks using the WHO naming convention. Mkettleson (talk) 02:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 2 February 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. This has garnered a lot of attention due to the preceding events taking place rapidly and rightly so. While, there is a policy-supported reasoning to use "2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak" (namely WP:NCMED), we also have policies in place (namely WP:COMMONNAME) which dictate using names that are against the aforementioned policy. Some of the supports also chose alternative capitalization, which might not be conforming of NCMED, COMMONNAME or NCCAPS. Coming to the final aspect of assessing consensus, NCMED is treated as a guideline w.r.t the current English Wikipedia Manual of Style whereas WP:COMMONNAME is a part of the official WP:Article titles policy in place. Some of the opposition to this requested move were of the view that the COMMONNAME policy should supersede the NCMED guidelines (or simply stated the COMMONNAME policy) given that "2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak" is the more recognized title (as observed in Google Trends and elsewhere). In light of guideline vs. policy conflict, as well as a lack of general consensus, and for the sake of completeness, I'm closing this as no consensus. qedk (t 桜 c) 07:59, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

---

2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak → 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak – As WHO has listed this outbreak as a global risk, the title should have a title that is potentially misleading changed - as the virus outbreak is no longer limited to Wuhan and/or China. Kirbanzo ^{(userpage - talk - contribs)} 02:33, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Edited to be "novel coronavirus outbreak" per emerging consensus. Kirbanzo ^{(userpage - talk - contribs)} 22:58, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support The outbreak has so far affected every continent except for Africa. TheEpicGhosty (talk) 02:53, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • I would go with "2019 novel coronavirus outbreak". This is a specific coronavirus. And we should bring it in line with Talk:Novel_coronavirus_(2019-nCoV)#Requested_move_31_January_2020 Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:55, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support I didn't see any report citing Wuhan Coronavirus all over the world except Taiwan's. Natureindex (talk) 17:18, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose Wuhan Coronavirus is the current most identifying name for the the virus. The common person is not calling this virus nCov-2019 or novel coronavirus. It is a stretch to assume that anyone would mistake this title to mean it is only affecting China or Wuhan. Especially if one were to read the article they had just searched for. Wilsonahrens (talk) 01:28, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support for "2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak" instead. Without or with the (2019-nCoV) addendum. Which would be the title as proposed in the above thread, which is better as it's the one WHO actually uses per here. This also brings the move request to fall in coordination with the page on the virus, Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV). This brings into relevance to note the consensus established on that article's Talk against a move request there to 'Wuhan coronavirus' on the grounds of:

1) Opposition through the "multiple documented issues with over-enthusiastically naming diseases after places."

2) Support for the primacy of officially-designated names over common names if the latter are not "the common name."

Sleath56 (talk) 03:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• WHO uses "Novel Coronavirus 2019" Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

This may be a technically correct way to name the disease, but it doesn't really reflect the outbreak, which occured mostly in 2020 (so far). We could name it *"2019-20 outbreak of the Novel Coronavirus 2019", but that seems unnecessarily clumsy. Renerpho (talk) 03:28, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

That naming seems to be for the virus itself (hence 2019-nCoV), which could be brought as a point of order on the page for the virus, but 2019-20 is better as this article details the outbreak which, unfortunately, has carried over into 2020. Sleath56 (talk) 03:31, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Sure we can add the 20. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:03, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support for Sleath's 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak as it moves us in the right direction. I think the lowercase approach is correct and "2019-20" clearly indicates which novel coronavirus is being referenced. - Wikmoz (talk) 21:51, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose as originally suggested, but support 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak. Renerpho (talk) 03:23, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Changing vote to Wait, upon announcement that an official name may be announced soon. Renerpho (talk) 13:45, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

• Move to 2019–20 Novel coronavirus outbreak as many others suggested it to follow English grammar. But Novel needs to capitalised N. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.137.171.220 (talk) 03:37, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  As with many disease names, the term 'novel coronavirus' is not a proper in of itself to require capitalization. For example: WHO in the page cited uses "On this website you can find information and guidance from WHO regarding the current outbreak of novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV)..." Sleath56 (talk) 03:50, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose as originally suggested, but support 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak. CASSIOPEIA^(talk) 03:57, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support for Any name without Wuhan or China. example (Option 1) "Move to 2019–20 coronavirus outbreak, or (Option 2) Move to Novel Coronavirus 2019 -20 outbreak. Description about (Option 2) it is consistent with the official name by WHO and additional description about year 2019 to 2020. Goodtiming8871 (talk) 03:59, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Move to

2019-20 Novel Coronavirus outbreak. The virus has spread to the world, and it doesn't only affect Wuhan. Peterwu2019 (talk) 04:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose keep the same name, as this is a perfectly good name, but putting "novel" in the name is clearly temporary. This was discussed quite recently. It does not matter that "Wuhan" is in the title as that is the origin and the most significantly affected place. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 04:16, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Supportive but concerned. In general, I really like the idea of removing Wuhan from the title and having all of these topics reference Novel coronavirus

However, the article currently is largely limited to discussing activity in China and we're already at 400 references. And there's another topic 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak by country and territory tracking the international outbreak that is blowing up as well. On the talk page there, there's discussion of splitting that one by region (2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak in Europe)

Maybe a short term fix for this one is 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak in China? Not sure what the answer is. - Wikmoz (talk) 04:28, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

The correct procedure as I see it would be to propose a move request for that page as the same concerns brought up here would apply there as well. Sleath56 (talk) 04:37, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Changed to clearer suggestion below. - Wikmoz (talk) 13:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME and WP:RECENT, not convinced that the common used name has changed and we can't just make a unilateral change. It it turns out people are calling it something else in hindsight we can certainly change the name in the future. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 05:04, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  Comment The assumption that "Wuhan coronavirus outbreak" is the common name is far from established. A Google search for "Novel coronavirus outbreak" returns 16,800,000 results. Whereas "Wuhan coronavirus outbreak" returns at 100k higher at 16,900,000 results. As such, it is far from the case that the current "Wuhan coronavirus" is the Common name and in fact that the proposed alternative stands very close in utility. Thus those parameters of WP:COMMONNAME are not applicable and in fact as the guidelines there state: " When there are multiple names for a subject, all of which are fairly common, and the most common has problems, it is perfectly reasonable to choose one of the others." Sleath56 (talk) 05:27, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  I think it would be misleading to use the grand total of all results to find the WP:GHITS - this strain is not the only novel coronavirus. A much better test for the common name would be to use Google Trends which shows that Wuhan coronavirus is exponentially more common. Cheers,  Vanilla  Wizard  💙 09:44, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  Thanks for the attempt to clarify, the Google Trends method is not ideal but serves more practicality. However, I believe there are faults in your method. Setting for international search (instead of just the United States as your result reflected) and using "" for exact terms within the last 30 days, the result comes out like this: the terms are much closer to parity and "Wuhan coronavirus" while still ahead is certainly not "exponentially more common" This result shows that the "Novel coronavirus" jumping to a mere 19% difference at present after the adoption of the term by the WHO and it indicates that the term "Wuhan coronavirus" while still trending above, especially at the onset of the outbreak, is nowhere near being definitively the WP:COMMONNAME. Sleath56 (talk) 17:27, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  When I follow the provided link which specifies that the trends are worldwide and from the last 30 days, what I see is that the term "Wuhan coronavirus" is consistently being more widely used and by a rather large margin, and is the preferred term in nearly all countries. With all due respect, I think this certainly adds to the list of reasons to consider "Wuhan coronavirus" to be the WP:COMMONNAME.  Vanilla  Wizard  💙 23:14, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  I think we can agree it's not, as you say, "exponentially more common". Indeed, as I've admitted, "Wuhan coronavirus" was the predominant term, and if we had this conversation days ago, I'd be forced to agree with the pure statistical imbalance no matter my views. However, since the WHO has adopted the term in popular use, though as an editor below has stated, its not the only officially used term, the gap between the two is very noticeably closing. Especially on the weekly window. I can respect a disagreement in opinion. I think the move request was a little premature, so undoubtedly we'll be repeating the same conversation a week from now. Hopefully, a proper term will be decided then, though my belief is that an official term is preferable so long as a common term is not the WP:COMMONNAME, and which I believe "Wuhan coronavirus" isn't, especially recently. Furthermore, this page must line up regardless of the outcome here with the page on the virus itself, which has already discarded the term "Wuhan coronavirus" in preference for a term in line with the RS/MC. Sleath56 (talk) 23:33, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  At nearly all points on that graph, bar the three-hour-long spike of "novel coronavirus" on January 30th, the term "Wuhan coronavirus" has been between 1.5x and 2x as frequent as "novel coronavirus" and as of right now it's 1.6x as common. I do, however, agree with your belief that this move is premature. In my view, the best option is to close this move request as not moved, then wait (preferably for at least two or three weeks) to see if any name emerges as the obvious best choice. As of right now, I think it's too early to get a good consensus for any proposed title.  Vanilla  Wizard  💙 00:56, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak its pretty basic and i am supporting it. We do not need anymore extra name in between.Regice2020 (talk) 05:41, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  For clarity, please follow the procedure of citing 'Oppose' for opposition unless proposing an alternative name to keep vote tracking easier. That would be a position of 'Oppose,' is it not? Sleath56 (talk) 07:29, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

  I cancel my vote. This was obvious change it should went for "coronavirus outbreak" as the article title in the first place. Right now i am seeing back and forth. Have nice day. Regice2020 (talk) 07:55, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose because there are many types of coronavirus, this outbreak is of Wuhan coronavirus, not about the other types of coronavirus.Rafaelosornio (talk) 05:53, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support - The current consensus in the medical field is against naming pathogens and events after people or human settlements. I'd suggest moving it to the new target and suggesting Wuhan Virus as an alternative name, thought there appear to be at least a dozen casual names floating around. Tsukide (talk) 08:33, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose the proposed title & weaker oppose on replacing "Wuhan" with "Novel." The current title is accurate, unambiguous, and the common name. Novel coronavirus would be better than just "coronavirus", but "Wuhan coronavirus" is both the common name & more specific than either proposal because the term "Wuhan coronavirus" refers specifically to the 2019-nCoV strain. I understand the concern that having "Wuhan" in the name makes it sound like the virus is limited only to Wuhan when it's clearly spread throughout the world, so I'm not strongly opposed to the alternative proposal, but when I read the title I assume it to mean "2019-20 outbreak of the Wuhan coronavirus" and not "2019-20 coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan" (if that explanation makes any sense).  Vanilla  Wizard  💙 09:44, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• It looks increasingly likely that the virus will be moved to “2019 novel coronavirus” when the RM there is complete, so I would advise against being a stickler for “2019–20” lest the page end up at 2019–20 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak (sic). Dekimasuよ! 10:26, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment, From my understanding, "Novel Coronavirus 2019": It would meet the requirement of WP:NPV, Although one of the examples name below has "the greatest number of google search results" and I don't think that it is a proper name :Sydney Virus, Washington Virus, U.S.A Virus, London Virus or, British Virus as, I saw that one of the newspaper in Melbourne of Australia named the current virus as a China Virus: I believe that it could create potential negative influence in our society.

As WHO uses "Novel Coronavirus 2019" as an official recommended name. Please refer to the related article link from WHO below.[[6]]and there are a few options of the names on this talk page.

Regarding "Requested move 2 February 2020"

Would it be possible for us to go for two steps.

Step 1: Decide whether we can change the name

Step 2: if we pass the step 1, select the best name for the current the title of this article. Goodtiming8871 (talk) 10:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose it is known in media as the wuhan virus. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 12:10, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose - The place of outbreak or the extent of its eventual distrubution should not change the pathogen's name. It's a usual procedure and rather commonplace to name emerging pathogens after the place of their first discovery.

Examples include:

• Norovirus: named after Norwalk, Ohio
• Ebola virus: named after Ebola River, DR Congo
• Marburg virus: named after Marburg, Germany
• West Nile virus: named after West Nile Province, Uganda
• Zika virus: named after Zika Forest, Uganda
• MERS virus (aka 2012-nCoV): named after the Middle East

A change in affected areas has no effect on the pathogen's name.

Thus the title 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak doesn't refer to the place where the disease occurs (i.e. some "Wuhan outbreak" of any coronavirus), but to the fact that it's an outbreak of the specific Wuhan coronavirus regardless of its extent.

89.206.114.57 (talk) 12:44, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: In those cases as you've cited, a point of order which should be brought up that those names are also the officially designated ones used by WHO:

* Norovirus: named after Norwalk, Ohio Adopted by WHO

* Ebola virus: named after Ebola River, DR Congo Adopted by WHO

* Marburg virus: named after Marburg, Germany Adopted by WHO

* West Nile virus: named after West Nile Province, Uganda adopted by WHO

* Zika virus: named after Zika Forest, Uganda Adopted by WHO

* MERS virus (aka 2012-nCoV): Adopted by WHO

In all of those cases, the geographic name is also the official name as adopted by WHO. The point of order being brought up is not if geographic virus naming is always inapplicable but if a common name should be chosen over the official name. In this present case, the WHO has not adopted the term "Wuhan coronavirus" but instead "Novel coronavirus". It's not in my view that this current case is therefore comparable to those as the "Wuhan coronavirus" is a common name, not an official name, and also not the common name. Sleath56 (talk) 17:05, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

If you’re going to be pedantic I’m going to have to point out to you that the name the WHO uses is not “Novel coronavirus” as you have repeatedly stated. They have not actually designated *any* common or “official" name as you keep saying, what they did do was designate "2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease” (yes, the whole thing) as the preferred interim name. They have also designated "2019-nCoV" as a less preferred but still acceptable interim name [7]. Please stop repeating things that aren't true. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 17:48, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

There was no explicit view that "2019-nCoV" was a less preferred" statement on that page, if you required that clarification.

This is what I said in my statement of position: "Support for "2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak}}" instead. Without or with the (2019-nCoV) addendum." One, I don't view the WHO's statement as wholly contrary to that at the moment when the titling of the very page you cited is itself "Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV)" Second, Novel coronavirus being seen as an acceptable alternative to nCoV, which is the abbreviation, is already finding discussion on the virus page. Sleath56 (talk) 18:09, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Don’t be an jerk. Both are proposed by WHO but only one is recommended by WHO, thats pretty darn explicit. Care for me to clarify further? Ps. The abbreviation is 2019-nCoV not nCoV and no it isn't "an acceptable alternative." Horse Eye Jack (talk) 04:34, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Not sure why you thought it was appropriate to add a WP:PA, so stop before you get blocked. Beyond misconstruing my statement, you need to refer to the talk on the virus page before making your own conjectures for the community on what's appropriate or not. Sleath56 (talk) 19:15, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Note that WHO want to **brake the tradition** of naming diseases after locations for stigmatization and economic reasons (press conference on Feb 3, comments around 40min) Cheater no1 (talk) 15:20, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose - The virus is known as the "Wuhan" coronavirus and whether it has spread across the globe or it is restricted to Wuhan is irrelevant. See anon's comment above about Norovirus, Ebola, etc. --Kimon^talk 13:19, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose - The virus is generally known as the Wuhan Coronavirus. In the end, Wikipedia is to learn and not to be precisely correct while sacrificing usability. If you went to someone and asked "What is the novel Coronavirus" they might answer not actually knowing that it is simply the same thing as the Wuhan Coronavirus — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hushak (talk • contribs) 00:28, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment. I really like the idea of being consistent in referring to the virus as novel coronavirus across topic titles for now. However, this topic currently focuses in fine detail on the outbreak in China and international reaction to the outbreak in China with light details on its international spread. If changing the title to eliminate "Wuhan", then something like 2019–20 Novel coronavirus outbreak in China may be more immediately accurate. Don't know how we go international at this level of topic detail (we're already at 400 references). There's another topic 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak by country and territory tracking the international outbreak that is blowing up as well. On the talk page there, there's discussion of splitting that one by region (2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak in Europe). Perhaps that topic could be renamed to something like 2019–20 novel coronavirus international spread in parallel so the two topics clearly complement each other? Still just a short-term fix. Core virus details would continue to be directed to Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV). Unsure. Really tough with a news story of this magnitude being chronicled at this level of detail. - Wikmoz (talk) 13:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Move to 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak. The naming of Wuhan is misleading and contrary to recommended disease naming methods. Already a much more preferred name has been 2019-nCoV (by WHO, for example). The only reason I see not to use 2019-nCoV is that the resulting title "2019–20 2019-nCoV coronavirus outbreak" is excessively awkward in English. Rethliopuks (talk) 14:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Move to 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak per WP:NCMED. WP:NCMED should be clear enough, and keep the words lowercase. The interim names proposed by WHO are "2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease" and "2019-nCoV". The former cannot be found in sources so per WP:COMMONNAME and WP:NCMED, it cannot be used. The latter is an acronym which translates to "2019 novel coronavirus" and since it needs to be unambiguous, recognizable and natural per WP:NAMINGCRITERIA, the acronym is not recommended. Even if "novel coronovirus" may be a temporary name (just like what happened with MERS-CoV when it was also called "novel coronavirus"), the current title needs to change as it needs to be the "scientific or recognised medical name" even though it's a provisional name. Also, take note that there is an ongoing discussion for "novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV)" to be moved, and both of these article names need to be in line. The rest of my arguments can also be found there. LightKeyDarkBlade (talk) 18:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
  • Update. I believe I would have to retract my initial comment per WP:NCEVENTS, specifically WP:DESCRIPTOR under the "Health incidents and outbreaks" section. However, I would like to emphasise that the page is a guideline and not a policy. Even so, the guideline implies that the current title is acceptable, with "where and what", and year added for disambiguation. And only when we get a final name on the virus, we'll move it to "2019–20 Wuhan *final name of virus* outbreak", with the virus name italicised using Template:DISPLAYTITLE. This is in accordance with WP:NCEVENTS and WP:NCMED. All being said, the page about the virus itself (Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV)) is not affected by WP:NCEVENTS but is affected by WP:NCMED. LightKeyDarkBlade (talk) 19:05, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose there is a long tradition in the English language of naming pathogens like this after the place of discovery, see Spanish Flu and then Hong Kong Flu and Russian Flu from the 1960s and 1970s. SARS was actually an outlier in this long series as it was not names after Guangdong where it originated. Wikimucker (talk) 18:56, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Comment Traditions can change; they are merely what (often) happened in times past and are not themselves binding. The current recommendation of the medical community and WHO is to avoid naming diseases with place or person names.Rethliopuks (talk) 10:41, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Move to 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak there are already chinese persons complaining about discrimination "Chineses queixam-se de discriminação por causa do coronavírus"["Chinese persons complain about discrimination due to the coronavirus"] due to the name "Wuhan" associated right next to the coronavirus. The virus has since its inicial outbreak expanded to other countries. I understand the reasoning of naming viruses as historically accurate (Spanish Flu, etc...) but we should be pragmatic and not create any further unecessary discrimination. FranciscoMMartins (talk) 19:35, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Another Comment. - I understand the historical precedent for naming a virus after its (usually more obscure) location of origin. However, please consider the current best practice published by the WHO in 2015: World Health Organization Best Practices for the Naming of New Human Infectious Diseases, May 2015 ...it's a quick read and explains why using location names are problematic. I'd support replacing Wuhan with novel to bring the topic in line with the corresponding Wikipedia virus entries (1 and 2) and the name currently used by WHO, NIH, and NHS. My only real concern as stated above is that we also need to consider how the current topic content aligns with the title. - Wikmoz (talk) 20:05, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose - Its fine if the medical term for the virus is located at the proper article. We need to keep in mind WP:RECOGNIZABILITY when it comes to a worldwide perspective for the outbreak. The average person is not going to instantly recognize what a novel coronavirus is. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:44, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

That's a fair point as "Wuhan coronavirus" is still the most popular term, though the term's relative popularity (7 day view) is dropping fast relative to novel coronavirus. That said, I think we also need to factor consider Precision and Consistency (Deciding on an article title). - Wikmoz (talk) 21:06, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose - The current title is more descriptive and identifies where the virus strain originated. Octoberwoodland (talk) 22:27, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support Move - Coronavirus isn't localized to Wuhan. Possible issue of discrimination. WHO advise against associating virus names with city or people. 11 million people wouldn't like to be associated with a virus for everyone outside of China. Please have some sympathy and/or respect for these people. They have already suffered enough. A slight inconvenience for moving is greatly outweigh by the positives. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newslack (talk • contribs) 00:08, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose While the coronavirus isn't necessarily localized to Wuhan nearly every case can be connected to the Wuhan region based on recent history. I do understand that some may see this as becoming a pejorative, but the common name should remain until this coronavirus has been officially named or some other common name replaces it. The 2019 coronavirus is possible but an unlikely name, either way we should not be WP:CRYSTALBALL in this situation and remain with this name for this outbreak for now. Krazytea(talk) 04:09, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support move - WP:CommonName is coming into play here, and with the WHO declaration, this isn't regional just to Wuhan, even if you are only seeing this as an issue only in China. Common sense also seems to dictate this should be moved. Also, Google hits for this and news hits are way higher than when you use the term Wuhan, and the WHO does not refer to it this way, per DocJames. Isingness (talk) 05:10, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment Perhaps a better possible name would be 2019-20 Wuhan coronavirus epidemic. --Charsum (talk) 06:08, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wait. I think the name should be of the form "XXX outbreak", where "XXX" is replaced by the name of the disease, not of the virus. The WHO has recommended that the interim name of the disease causing the current outbreak be "2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease".[8] If we rename the page at all, that should replace the "XXX". Since this is a bit of a mouthful and the name is only temporary, let's wait till they come up with the definitive name. But if we must rename the page and "2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease outbreak" is too long, I prefer "2019-nCoV outbreak" over "2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak". That shorter name is actually used by the WHO [9] and in the professional literature [10].  --Lambiam 07:51, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
• Support. It is becoming global, and there isn't another 2019-2020 coronavirus outbreak for this to be confused with.--Eostrix (talk) 07:57, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose. Wuhan Virus or Wuhan Coronavirus is the common name of the media, and is unambiguous. Possible negative associations and views of China due to the name is irrelevant, lest we rename Spanish Flu, Ebola, West Nile Virus, MERS, etc.47.144.147.17 (talk) 07:57, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose, I think it won't be better to rename the page for the present Wuhan Coronavirus as the name is very specific, changing it may bring confusion.The Living love 10:45, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• I personally don't believe moving it is a good thing, but I reluctantly support the move anyways based on WP:NCMED and the need to follow the MOS. WP:COMMONNAME does not apply here and in other cases when titling articles about diseases or conditions. The formal, official name, even if it's not the common name should be used in articles about diseases, such as myocardial infarction or bovine spongiform encephalopathy. Media organizations don't get any weight, "The article title should be the scientific or recognised medical name that is most commonly used in recent, high-quality, English-language medical sources." I believe the best name is one that's around 2019-2020 novel coronavirus outbreak or something that includes the actual, current, disease name. Also, talking about what the virus should be called is not an argument. The virus is called "2019 novel coronavirus" or "2019-nCoV". That's the official name and the official name is the ONLY one we should be considering according to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Medicine-related articles. English language medical sources are the only ones we should be considering to determine the official name. Grognard Extraordinaire Chess (talk) Ping when replying 11:15, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: Changing the name of the article subject in accordance with the WHO Recommendations From my understanding, according to international and ethical norms, it is not appropriate to follow an previous WHO rule of the virus name in Wikipedia, which previously followed a local or country name: examples: Spanish flu, Ebola virus Middle East respiratory syndrome and others...

I think it is appropriate to follow the current recommendations of the U.S. & United Kingdom Government: NIH, and NHS and the names recommended by the WHO. The reasons are as follows:

• The Social Role of Wikipedia: English Wikipedia has a strong social impact as an example: to be used in the program as a reference for Microsoft Word. Using it as a standard heading in Wikipedia can bring a huge social impact, and I believe that it is socially responsible as the world's largest encyclopedia and numerous readers all over the world every day access this article here.
• Complaining about the Chinese being discriminated against by the name of the new corona virus. Chinese persons complain about discrimination due to the corona virus [[11]] including Anti-China, in some cases, anti-Asian backlash and it would make racism worse in our global society. [[12]] Another example of discrimination: As I personally saw on social media, Koreans living in the United States, or Australia, were discriminated against for being Asian as they are the same skin color with Chinese.

As an one practical example, when a 10-year-old Korean girl goes to school, her co-students bulled her that she could be infected with a Chinese coronavirus so that a young girl refuses to go to school while crying at home. I could understand the painful heart of the mother of the young child.

• Although there have been many cases where WHO has created the names of viruses by region or country names, it is now WHO that established new regulations(or norms) in consideration of side effects that have occurred. In the future and for now WHO would no longer use virus names using local, or country.

Considering the social role of Wikipedia which is the largest and influential encyclopedia in the world, I ask for your thoughtful and kind consideration in the Wikipedia editors so that the terminology of neutrality can be used instead of using discriminant terms as per WHO recommendation: link:[13] Goodtiming8871 (talk) 12:23, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Please refer to that I've removed my previous writing after reading the feedback from other Wikipedians.

From my understanding, my previous writing might be too emotional to other Wikipedia editors.

From my point of view, I want to see the issue of 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak resolved asap without undesirable side effects in our global society. Goodtiming8871 (talk) 23:23, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose. Wikipedia should adopt the most common name in the world and it is Wuhan Coronavirus now. -- hoising (talk) 13:22, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose for two reasons: 1) Place of origin (or predominance) is a common means of naming diseases, e.g., Spanish flu. 2) "novel" is a poor replacement, because novel just means new, and there could be another new coronavirus at some point in the future, as well as continued outbreaks of the now-"old" one. --2601:444:380:8C00:9592:B507:7129:7D03 (talk) 16:58, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME and WP:NCEVENTS#Conventions. --- C&C (Coffeeandcrumbs) 16:59, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wait. Right now, most people refer to this as the "Wuhan virus" or something similar. If Wikipedia was alive in 1918, we might have named the Spanish flu as the "Soldier's disease" (for a while until the Spanish flu became prevalent). The 1918 influenza pandemic is more technically correct but Spanish flu is the everyday name. We are not a medical organization like WHO, who must choose the names that it first applies carefully.

If something major happens (say, Hong Kong becomes the major source, far exceeding Wuhan) and the majority of people start to use "Wuhan and Hong Kong virus", we might do the same. With redirects, it's not a big deal to change a title (except for these discussions). What do you say? Is it OK to leave the name as it is and then, in a year or two, revisit this discussion? --RoyGoldsmith (talk) 18:44, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose for now. Current title is commonly used and easily recognisable. It is entirely possible for the situation to change in a month or two, but at this point moving would be premature.--Staberinde (talk) 20:37, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose for now: Too soon to establish a definite and concrete change of WP:COMMONNAME. Wikipedia should not be a frontrunner in terminology change, no matter how noble the justification may be. Give it a month or so, and we can revisit this issue at a more sensible time. --benlisquare_T•C•E 00:23, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wait. At some point in the near future the virus will be given a designation that describe symptoms (such as respiratory, spongiform, deficiency), groups affected (juvenile, pediatric, maternal), time course (acute, transient), severity, seasonality (winter, summer), and even arbitrary identifiers (Alpha, beta, a, b, I, II, III, 1, 2, 3). 2019-nCoV is just a temporary placeholder. Jtreyes (talk) 01:00, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment. Should we use the technically-correct, medically-approved name or the common, everyday name? 1918 influenza pandemic vs. Spanish flu. Or 2009 flu pandemic vs. Swine flu. --RoyGoldsmith (talk) 01:29, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose. Unfortunately Wuhan coronavirus will turn to be a epidemic, because speed of spread, or even worse, turn to be pandemic, therefore I preffer to wait to a more common name such as 2019 coronavirus epidemic than moving now to a new name. Would be unnecessary extra effort moving now, just wait. Carlosguitar ^{(Yes Executor?)} 02:32, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose. The common name should stay. We can include WHO's official name, when it become available. The logic for the renaming proposal is unsound, given that we have names like German measles or Spanish flu. Nerd271 (talk) 02:36, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Summary We've blown past 5,000 words and the proposal changed mid-discussion making things a little confusing so I thought it may be helpful to summarize key points being repeated with respect to 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak. Feel free to suggest an edit if I missed a major argument. - Wikmoz (talk) 03:08, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Support

• WP:NCMED as it aligns with scientific naming by WHO, NIH, and NHS
• WP:CONSISTENT with Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease, and Novel coronavirus
• Conforms to WHO Best Practice Guidelines (2015), which advises against using location names
• WP:CAPITALIZATION as "novel" is descriptive and not a proper noun
• Virus is now global; including a location name may be confusing
• "Wuhan" may support anti-China discrimination seen on social media and opinion media
• MOS:LEADALT may be used to recognize common name

Oppose

• The International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses hopes to announce the official name "within days".
• WP:RECOGNIZABILITY and WP:COMMONNAME based on Google Trends (30 day view)
• Location in name is consistent with historical precedent (e.g. MERS, Ebola, Spanish flu)
• WP:CONSISTENT with Timeline of the 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak and 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak by country and territory

"Novel coronavirus" suggests the whole class of novel coronaviruses, which is misleading. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cheater no1 (talk • contribs) 20:02, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Updated with news that the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses will name the virus within days. Credit to Deryck for spotting this story. - Wikmoz (talk) 19:16, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support move to 2019–20 Novel Coronavirus outbreak. To quote WP:NCMED: "The article title should be the scientific or recognised medical name that is most commonly used in recent, high-quality, English-language medical sources, rather than a lay term (unscientific or slang name) or a historical eponym that has been superseded." That seems quite clear. It also seems sensible, the practice of naming for cities or countries has past baggage and unfortunate side effects, so happy to follow the medical field's guidance on the topic -- which is the point of the WP:NCMED advice. It also protects against recentism, as the WHO label will likely stick for a while. Chris vLS (talk) 04:24, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Note that WP:NCMED is only part of a guideline. This is overridden by the policy at Wikipedia:Article titles. So some of the support arguments are not based on policy and should not be given as much weight as policy based arguments. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 05:06, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Very interesting. Is this clearly stated anywhere? I assumed direction in Wikipedia:Manual of Style was on almost equal footing as policy in terms of editing guidance but I'm probably wrong. I found relevant text on Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines, which states: "Policies are standards all users should normally follow, and guidelines are generally meant to be best practices for following those standards in specific contexts." and "Whether a policy or guideline is an accurate description of best practice is determined by the community through consensus." - Wikmoz (talk) 05:47, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support: Although focused in Wuhan, the outbreak has reached outside mainland china. It should get it's own section in 2019-20 novel coronavirus outbreak simplified. Can I Log In (talk) 05:03, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose. Wikipedia should adopt the most recognisable name in the world otherwise we are trying to influence the naming. Currently Wuhan is most associated with this virus, it identifies where the virus strain originated and it is the epicentre with the most cases and deaths. Ozcloudwarrior (talk) 08:57, 4 February 2020 (UTC)— Ozcloudwarrior (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• Opposehelps understand where the outbreak began and mainly occurred; the virus originated in Wuhan province Salty1984 (talk) 10:39, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose, the name is a critical part of WP:RECOGNIZABILITY for our readers. Britishfinance (talk) 13:55, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• Support move to 2019–20 Novel Coronavirus outbreak. Spanish Flu is not a comparative case. Simply because there was no intergovernmental authority like WHO to give an official name but there is today. It’s fine for press to use “Wuhan Coronavirus” or other similar names before an official name is given, or just to make a shorter headline writing. When both WHO and the originating country’s government choose “2019-2020 Novel Coronavirus” as the official name, it should be adopted by Wikipedia as well. Just because Google Trends shows “Wuhan Coronavirus” is more common than “Novel Coronavirus” at this moment doesn’t mean that it’s plausible to name this page “Wuhan Coronavirus”. Otherwise “China Coronavirus” should also be considered since it surpasses “Wuhan Coronavirus” on Google Trend by an even greater percentage. Victortarrantino (talk) 14:15, 4 February 2020 (UTC) — Victortarrantino (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• Comment, I am neither opposed nor in support of the potential name change, however I think that if the name of the article is changed that the common name should be included within the article. To many, 2019 novel coronavirus is relatively meaningless, but Wuhan coronavirus is much more recognizable. Blaise170 (talk) 14:40, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• Comment One thing is the Wuhan coronavirus (2019-nCoV) and another thing is the Wuhan coronavirus in Wuhan. Wuhan coronavirus (2019-nCoV) is worldwide. Wuhan coronavirus (2019-nCoV) is the name of this new virus. If you change the page will be confusing because it is not an outbreak of all family of coronavirus, this outbreak is only an outbreak of Wuhan coronavirus (2019-nCoV), it is not an outbreak of the other coronavirus.Rafaelosornio (talk) 15:06, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• Support clearly have seen WHO, government agencies and later media have moved from using "Wuhan coronavirus" to "Novel coronavirus". xinbenlv ^{Talk, Remember to "ping" me} 19:18, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose/Wait While the proposed title is more scientifically correct, the designation 2019-nCoV is itself a placeholder. At some point in the future, this virus and its disease will become formally named by WHO. At that time, it will make more sense to rename this page. In the meantime, "2019-20 Novel Coronavirus outbreak" is a terrible title. The virus is the 2019 Novel Coronavirus, not the "2019-20 Novel Coronavirus". And if you are dating the outbreak as part of its description, then you end up with a name like "2019-20 2019 Novel Coronavirus outbreak". The current name is much preferable to that. Overall, I agree that this page needs to be renamed, but the proper new name is not yet obvious. EMS | Talk 19:31, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
• support to 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak. When I saw this title a few days (weeks?) ago, I thought it was about the outbreak in Wuhan/China; like "Australian bush fires". Opposers are basing on the basis of WP:CONSISTENCY with "Timeline of the 2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak", and "2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak by country and territory". All these articles should be moved too. We have to confront the truth that English Wikipedia is the trendsetter of Internet. This article is about the outbreak of a virus commonly known as "novel corona virus", believed to be originated in Wuhan. But now the virus has spread globally. The article will soon get its focus on other parts of the world as well. Regarding "novel" being a temporary name: well X ray was a remporary name too. But currently "novel corona virus" is common name. Also per all the support points mentioned in the table by Wikmoz. The article is about global outbreak of novel coronavirus, with a big chunk of coverage of the origin (Wuhan). It is logical to move it to "2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak". —usernamekiran (talk) 20:43, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

• "We have to confront the truth that English Wikipedia is the trendsetter of Internet." - And this is precisely the problem. For better or for worse, how Wikipedia names things has excessive sway and influence over how other publications name things. When the Bradley Manning article was moved to Chelsea Manning, newspaper sources were roughly 50:50 in name usage prior to the Wikipedia move, however eventually 99.9% of publications used "Chelsea Manning" after the move. That's why the naming of Kiev/Kyiv is such a controversial issue on Wikipedia; whoever "wins" on Wikipedia eventually "wins" everywhere else. One problem with renaming the coronavirus outbreak article is that a couple of the !votes here seem to be arguing a move for the purpose of righting great wrongs (e.g. an occasional argument used above is that "Wuhan coronavirus" stigmatises the city residents of metropolitan Wuhan). Based on Wikipedia policy (not guidelines, but policy), it is WP:NOT Wikipedia's job to fix the world's injustices or pursue noble righteousness; it is supposed to be a tertiary source information reference that covers information found in existing literature. If a change is to occur, it should occur within the existing body of literature before it occurs on Wikipedia, and not the other way around. --benlisquare_T•C•E 02:51, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support for the primary reason that this virus has spread worldwide. Thinking of the long–term, there are issues with both page titles using the word ″outbreak″. I can't help but wonder at what point an outbreak becomes a pandemic? The coronavirus has spread in such a way as to already satisfy the first part of the definition of a pandemic: in that it has spread worldwide, across multiple continents. In fact, the Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) is already listed on the Wiki pandemic page under 4.3.2 (Concerns about possible future pandemics). Things are certainly heading in the pandemic direction, although I note that the word ′pandemic′ is not readily used in Wiki page titles. I tend to agree with User:Wikimucker that the 2001 SARS outbreak was the exception regarding geographical aspect escaping being named. On Wiki's Severe acute respiratory syndrome page, the outbreak aspect has settled down nicely into a subsection 8.1 Outbreak in South China So for these reasons, I think the geographical aspect ′Wuhan′ should be dropped. The other issue is that the current title is well–established on Google. If it′s moved, even with redirects, it will have to be re–established as a search term. Having said all this, in the future this ′outbreak′ will probably be called something completely different; ″the Fourth Plague Pandemic″! SpookiePuppy (talk) 01:55, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
• Support: since the WHO page uses the name Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), we should too. prat (talk) 02:18, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. People search mainly for "China coronavirus" and "Wuhan coronavirus".[14] 99% of cases occured in China. "Novel" is the worst possible name for the virus and the outbreak because after the next coronavirus outbreak, "novel" will have lost its meaning and will become a misleading and nonsensical naming for the 2019 coronavirus. Xenagoras (talk) 11:28, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

  Comment: While I also oppose this change, it is worth pointing out that the current title will be retained as a redirect to the new location if this page is moved. So what people search for is a red herring. The real issue is what in terms of Wikipedia guidelines is most proper. In that respect, the concern of the use of the word "Novel" is more appropriate. I also reiterate my concern above that the proposed name is the right answer if the page is to be moved. Perhaps 2019-20 2019-nCoV outbreak would be better, but I first want to see that the WHO designation sticks and becomes more commonly used than "Wuhan coronavirus". EMS | Talk 17:43, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment: There now is a page called 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease. This is important since it is the disease that the outbreak is of, with the virus as the cause. Even 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease is a placeholder name for now. Once again I council people to wait and not rename this page until we know what this disease will be called in the longer term. EMS | Talk 19:40, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose This is not the official name, but it is the common name. Additionally, "novel coronavirus" is a placeholder name. Rest assured, this virus will have a proper name some day, and we can hold this notvote then. Natureium (talk) 23:47, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose 'Wuhan' is the best bad option available at this time. The problem with "novel" it doesn't associate a place name so for anyone unfamilair with the medical terminology it won't be clear what the article is about. But mention China (or a chinese name) with virus, it becomes clear. -- GreenC 03:26, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose, for seveal reasons, including 1) "novel" is a very vague word, to be avoided in an encyclopedia or a scientific article, 2) all major common names of this otbreak relate to Wuhan, and 3) traditionally the otbreak name reflects the place of origin, and not the all affected areas. Materialscientist (talk) 09:02, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wait News articles say that the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV) is in the process of giving the virus a proper name and I suggest we wait until the name is officially announced before moving the article. reference news article 1.02 editor (T/C) 09:34, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose People know this virus as "Wuhan virus" or "Coronavirus" People who know it as the "wuhan virus" might not know the "novel coronavirus" name. Anyway they are going to give it an official name soon so we can move it then. Orangewarning (talk) 11:24, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

A user moved page before the discussion is closed

Reverting to original name: I do have an opinion on this move suggestion, but I a) don't see this discussion approaching a consensus, and b) if the info pointed out above is correct, a long-term (ie non-interim) name is perhaps not very far away, so as has been pointed out, there will likely be a move to be made anyway. However, the move to the current name was seriously flawed, and in my view runs counter to policy - As I've pointed out elsewhere, "2019-20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak is ambiguous between the two meanings: "2019-20 outbreak of Wuhan coronavirus" and "2019-20 outbreak of coronavirus in Wuhan" (the latter of which is certainly not an accurate description of this article). I'm therefore moving this page back to the name pre-move, which was 2019-20 nCoV-2019 outbreak, or something along those lines (even if that is a shitty title, at least its accurate - and that's a requirement per the relevant policy - see point three - precision. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sean Heron (talk • contribs) 15:28, 6 February 2020 (UTC)  Administrator note I have moved the title back to the one noted in this move request, which is confusing enough as it is. I also move protected the page — the only move to happen will be as a result of closing this move request, full stop. No more moves while it remains open. El_C 15:59, 6 February 2020 (UTC) Sorry, I didn't realise process trumps policy. I thought it made sense to make a bold move, considering the process wasn't really getting anywhere and there was the unresolved issue of ambiguity... Sean Heron (talk) 16:24, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Wait. The virus may get a new name soon.[15] For now, oppose moving to "2019-20 coronavirus outbreak" as I think the question "what coronavirus" ought to be addressed in the title; neutral to "2019-20 novel coronavirus outbreak" because "Wuhan" is a better descriptor but I understand concerns that the current title is ambiguous (is the outbreak in Wuhan [no, it's everywhere now] or is the virus from Wuhan [yes]). Prefer "2019-20 outbreak of Wuhan coronavirus" (1st choice) or keep title (2nd choice) until the virus' gets a new official name. Deryck C. 16:28, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment. This part of talk page is weighty, so i'm gonna do the tl;dr (someone already did it before, so it's just gonna be my opinion.)

Arguments for supporting:

• The World Health Organization, the National Institutes of Health, and the National Health Service just called Wuhan Coronavirus as a "novel".
• It's not just a Wuhan's coronavirus, but a coronavirus of a many cities in 28+ countries.

Arguments for opposing:

• Wuhan coronavirus is a most common name for this topic, but honestly, the more common name is "china virus". This virus is not novel at all now, it got used to be unknown/novel in it's fist month after being revealed.
• It mainly focus at Wuhan, and in it's first 2 weeks of being discovered it attacked only Wuhan.
• This topic might be created again during official name reveal. Not everyone likes placeholder names, while common name is different.

Awaiting counterarguments. --46.39.248.218 (talk) 17:14, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

• Comment. I think that until the virus is given a proper name, the title should be 2019-nCov outbreak. After all, the placeholder name of the virus includes the year the outbreak started. YttriumShrew (talk) 20:33, 7 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose: This is a viral outbreak that originated in Wuhan. There is nothing wrong with or misleading about such a title in light of that. The arguments based on preferring WHO's naming as "more scientific" requires two key assumptions: (1) That the WHO's naming is in fact more scientific (debatable), and (2) That we are primarily writing for scientists or science-interested persons (utterly false). I find the examples of sinophobia and xenophobia in news reports to be concerning, but I don't think they should trigger an opposite response from Wikipedia; namely, removing any to Wuhan province in the article title. I also find the arguments based on consistency with other coronavirus page titles to be unpersuasive: This is not an article about a virus or a disease, but about a particular outbreak that was first detected in Wuhan province. The proposed alternate titles, particularly "2019-nCov outbreak" strike me as needlessly opaque and painfully uninformative—I can imagine a reader encountering this page now, thinking, "What the heck is a 'nCov?' Why should I care about this when it has '2019' in the title?" Our readership does not consist of virologists. We are informing everyone from all walks of life, and using needlessly non-transparent terminology serves to alienate an enormous segment of our readership.
  Above all, we must remain mindful of the fact that there is no deadline. If the situation changes and the common name changes, or Wikipedia policy changes, this page can be renamed when that time comes. As such, I would argue that urgent demands to change the page name are both premature and inconsistent with Wikipedia policy. 199.66.69.88 (talk) 21:33, 7 February 2020 (UTC)
  • I want to add that I find the point that 2019-nCoV is no longer "novel" is probably incorrect, at least in terms of what a "novel" virus is. It does not mean that the virus is a novelty or is currently unknown in human terms, but in evolutionary terms. It is very much a novelty and even if it takes root and recurs, it will still be a novelty to our genomes for centuries.
    All this said, I believe the posters making this argument are happening upon an important point: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not a news service or the WHO's press desk. We are trying to write articles that will be relevant not only this week but next year. And while we need not be perfect right now, we should anticipate (based on past experience) what the COMMONNAME of this outbreak will be going forward. But for now, the onus is on those proposing a move, and without a clear candidate with a clear consensus to move, the current title should be retained. 199.66.69.88 (talk) 16:28, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support: Yes, the outbreak originated in Wuhan and the disease is being still being referred to as the Wuhan coronavirus occasionally, but I think it's already past that point and starting to be referred to as just "the coronavirus". Looking on google trends, it clearly shows how the spike for "coronavirus" has shot up the highest in comparison to the other search terms. Support for either "2019-20 novel coronavirus outbreak" or "2019-20 coronavirus outbreak". 24680FPIC (talk) 05:19, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Best argument for now. The "Novel" title is in fourth place, and just 'virus' are somehow included. --91.207.170.251 (talk) 15:05, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Now that the formal names are coming soon and we still haven't come to a consensus yet, I'd say wait until that comes out, then change this article, along with all related articles, to the formal name while leaving redirects behind. 24680FPIC (talk) 07:41, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose, per arguments by User:Knowledgekid87. The idea is, that in the future, after all that is over, novel can then be reused to mark some other coronavirus. The location of origin is therefore important. We have SARS and MERS, where the former expands to 'Severe Accute Respiratory Virus', and MERS to 'Middle-East Respiratory Virus'. In that case, MERS offers a precedent in qualifying a strain of the virus with the location where it originated from. -Mardus /talk 15:42, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose, fractionally, but let's not waste more time discussing, as this week the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses will announce an official name, which will certainly not include 'Wuhan', per the 2015 WHO guidelines to avoid prejudicial geographical and other labels. But pending that definitive new name, 'Wuhan' unambiguously identifies the topic. - Onanoff (talk) 16:31, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• Relevant News: A new post titled "The illness gets a name, temporarily." by The New York Times details a recent Chinese announcement, "The Chinese government has announced a temporary name for the illness caused by the coronavirus, ordering the local authorities and state news media to adopt it. In English, it will be called N.C.P., for novel coronavirus pneumonia, the national health commission said on Saturday. A final, official name will eventually be chosen by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses. The organization has submitted a name to a scientific journal for publication and hopes to reveal it within days, the BBC reported [on 5 Feb]." - Wikmoz (talk) 01:06, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Support. Based on Google News many media simply goes with "coronavirus". Hddty (talk) 03:29, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose: Keeping the original and most severe location is a long-time custom and Wikipedia should not surrender to the Chinese government. 🐱💬 05:32, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Delete These are ALL NON SENSE move request. Best for the page to be deleted and create a new very shorter version of information about Novel Coronavirus outbreak on a sub section in Coronvirus. Regice2020 (talk) 06:58, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

No. This article is about the coronavirus epidemic, something important enough to be spreading all over the news. Crushing it down into a small section in the Coronavirus article would be massively downplaying how large and influential this outbreak is. 24680FPIC (talk) 07:41, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Someone needs to take down that "daily growth rate" graphic down in the name of transparency

Hi there. Along this whole crisis I've been watching efforts to wash this epidemic and one of the worse actions is that transmission rate graphic just below the total number. Every single epidemiologist is stating that the numbers are being kept artificially down and anything that is catering to that is just bad intel. And can we protect this article once and for all? Thanks in advance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:8A0:F446:F601:E54C:48F5:879E:D778 (talk) 14:52, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

You need to discern between actual, suspected, and confirmed cases. Nobody knows the number of actual cases, and they never will, because there will be a number who are infected and don't know themselves, and some who are sick but the health system doesn't know about. Since we don't know we can only guess, based on our model for infection. Confirmed are those the health system know about, and have confirmed. Suspected are net determined yet, may end up confirmed or not. Of these the confirmed number is by far the most useful. These are the patients we almost certainly know are infected. It does not matter if you trust Chinese (or other) health system or not. jax (talk) 10:08, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Every single epidemiologist is stating that the numbers are being kept artificially down Sources, or it did not happen. You may spare us of your nakedly racist conspiracy theories. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 15:00, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

"***** Be polite and welcoming to new users, Assume good faith, Avoid personal attacks. This is on the top of this page. Maybe you should read it and abide by it CaradhrasAiguo. *****" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1702:2B70:B380:8559:EB36:3A3D:6FA3 (talk) 19:14, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

"Nakedly racist"? 209.240.32.65 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:18, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.88.222.194 (talk) 03:23, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

"Prof Neil Ferguson, a public health expert at Imperial College, said his “best guess” was that there were 100,000 affected by the virus even though there are only 2,000 confirmed cases so far, mostly in the city of Wuhan in China where the virus first appeared." This was over a fortnight ago.

So both the New York Times AND The Guardian, citing the highest epidemiological authorities in both the US and Europe, are spreading racist propaganda? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.50.168.130 (talk • contribs)

Claiming the numbers are being kept artificially down (which you have not provided any reliable sourcing for) is a far more extreme claim than this "best guess". CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 00:30, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

|Disagree| Until multiple reputable sources confirm that the numbers are being kept artificially down the graph stays. I was only able to find the same above 2 sources (or articles that use those articles as sources) and they are over 11 days old. 173.200.98.210 (talk) 17:54, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

There are no sources (that I have seen) that claim that the number of confirmed cases is being kept down artificially. Reasonable guesses regarding the total number of carriers are not shown as graphs or tables here because these only get published once a week or so, sporadically; they are referred to in the articles. If the place where they're mentioned is not the most natural place, then fix that, if it improves the overall balance of the article. Boud (talk) 13:24, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

What is being kept secret is the number of people surgically killed for their live organs per day in China - see organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China. At 10,000 or so per year, that's about 30 sacrifices per day, which is not too different from the number of 2019-nCoV deaths per day right now. But that's not a conspiracy theory: PRC is an authoritarian country and no government wants to reveal information on a crime against humanity that it's carrying out. And there's not much that we can do about it in Wikipedia except add reliably sourced information to organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China as the information emerges. We also don't have much justification for mentioning it in this article (except maybe as a See also link) unless a notable commentator chooses to make the comparison. The western mainstream media prefer 2019-nCoV reports over involuntary Falun Gong organ donations because the organ donor sacrifices don't risk spreading virally around the world. Boud (talk) 13:32, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

... if we don't have justification for mentioning it in this article, why on earth are you bringing it up in a discussion about this article, where nobody was talking about it?? 2601:601:9A7F:4A0:C9CE:D8FB:4CB4:F539 (talk) 05:41, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

The graphic was merely tracking the daily changes in the chart (entitled: "2019–20 nCoV outbreak by country and territory") that preceded it. If the data in the graphic was invalid, then so is the chart. The chart data is taken from this site: https://bnonews.com/index.php/2020/02/the-latest-coronavirus-cases/ The graphic was a very useful tool for tracking changes in the rate of growth. Perhaps a caveat regarding the source of the data would have been better than removal. If we aren't using China's numbers, then whose should be used? 67.69.69.198 (talk) 01:19, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

References

Those are estimates based on mathematical models. Even the NY Times article cites the then-current 17k figure provided by the Chinese government. It's unreasonable to suppress the actual number of reported cases due to distrust of the Chinese government. The rate of growth is one of the most important pieces of information contained in the article, and you've damaged the article by removing it. 67.69.69.198 (talk) 12:11, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

It is a pretty helpful tool. Try to ignore it if you dislike the growth rates. No idea who's from Every single epidemiologist said anything against daily growth rates --46.39.248.218 (talk) 12:31, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Number of Cases

Currently, the number of Japanese cases on the chart is 35, but there are sources (Here) that suggest the count is actually 45, due to cases aboard the Diamond Princess Cruise Ship. Should the wikipedia chart be updated to reflect this information? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kbeck640 (talk • contribs) 02:30, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

The number of cases in Japan includes 20 people from a cruise ship, which is not reflected in the government’s official count.<<== Nickayane99 (talk) 03:24, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

 Done We are including the ship's count in Japan, as it is in a Japanese port. Nguyen QuocTrung has updated the table. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:35, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

As of 2010, 7 February 2020 (UTC) the chart labeled "2019–20 nCoV outbreak by country and territory" still shows "Diamond Princess" as a separate location. These cases should be consolidated with the country Japan case totals (accounting for any duplication) as the ship is in Japanese territory and being managed exclusively the the government of Japan.Jtreyes (talk) 20:12, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Having separate numbers for the Diamond Princess could be useful for determining the death rate (under favorable conditions) because the epidemic on the ship should have a definite ending after which time we can compare the numbers of recovered and dead. JRSpriggs (talk) 09:49, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Containment Non-acceleration achieved outside of Hubei?

First, see the disclaimers above at Talk:2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak#Percent growth - @Chrisvls and Doc James: made several relevant warnings there.

In the first table at Template:2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus data/China medical cases by province, the number of new confirmed cases in PRC outside of Hubei has been stable at about 700-800 for 8 days. This is linear growth in the total number of confirmed cases, it's clearly not exponential growth. Unless these data are badly wrong (e.g. underreported, which seems unlikely outside of Hubei, where the hospital/medical system is not under the same crazy pressure), it seems quite likely that the epidemic has been contained become non-accelerating outside of Hubei: the linear growth is presumably a mix of local transmissions from the past few weeks and some Hubei-beyond-Hubei transmissions that get through the controls. So to me, this is good news.

However:

• The data in that first table at Template:2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus data/China medical cases by province is not quite trivial to extract from the sources. The more recent sources list cumulative totals, and the archival versions of the sources are not at regular times each day. The cumulative totals need to be subtracted (not terribly difficult in an appropriate file format), and analysed in terms of provinces.
• The sources are varied - leading to non-uniformity of the quality of the data in terms of sourcing.
• Any possible interpretations (such as a mix of non-Hubei–non-Hubei "local" transmission vs Hubei–non-Hubei "exported" transmission) should be done by an external source, not Wikipedians. My opinion here is not a RS.
• The last point especially applies to interpretations such as "the outbreak has been contained outside of Hubei". I used the word "contained" above as a non-specialist - probably an alternative term such as "has become containable" might be better, but epidemiologists should certainly be able to choose appropriate language.

If someone could find a source that uses the equivalent of the data that we have here (2020-01-20 to 2020-02-05: 1 20 44 70 184 272 352 416 459 603 703 760 816 608 813 835 731 707), then of course that could be used on these Wikipedia pages. (Easy fast plot: paste the list of values into tr ' ' '\n' |nl -ba |graph -TX -m0 -S 16 in a terminal; this presumes that you have plotutils installed.) Boud (talk) 14:09, 6 February 2020 (UTC) (terminology edit with strike; see below)

We could in principle make a graph and show it without interpretation. Boud (talk) 14:11, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

I appreciate this look, and it is interesting, but I think we should be super cautious here. When reliable WP:MEDRS sources start interpreting the data this way, then we should. Until then we probably should not. The fact that the graph is leading many editors to conclusions not yet supported by the many experts watching this -- some of whom are saying the opposite -- is an argument for removing it from the graph, not inviting more to make the conclusion. Some experts look at the same data about growth rate and still come to the conclusion that a pandemic is possible or likely, based on the size and dispersion of current infection population [16][17]. And there has been controversy about the flow of reported case data from the very start. And in the relevant timeframe there are reports of new restrictions on the flow of information [18] [19] An expert might very well come to the conclusion that this 'trend' is proof that the current case reporting numbers are inaccurate. I don't know. That's why I read the sources. The closest I find is the WHO director being optimistic about the spread outside China, not Hubei [20] But would love to see others. Chris vLS (talk) 16:11, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

And, also... hat tip to Boud for the plotutils, nice. Chris vLS (talk) 16:16, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Here's a an expression from Mike Ryan, WHO's top emergencies expert: other PRC provinces have "not the same acceleration" as in Hubei. It's a conservative way of saying "roughly zero acceleration for 8 days assuming no underreporting". Boud (talk) 19:36, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

800 new cases a day outside of Hubei is a lot. But agree it has shifted from exponential to linear growth it appears. So much is unknown to say it is contained. If there are asymptomatic superspreaders and one occurs in a system unable to do the RTPCR anything could happen. I personally doubt we will see the end until we have an effective vaccine. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:41, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I've struck "been contained" and replaced it by "become non-accelerating". Which is still good news in terms of management, but I agree that the word "contained" is very unlikely to be applicable. As you say, any asymptomatic superspreader getting through to a system that fails to detect it and to contain the new cluster would again grow exponentially. My guess is that a few months of continued strict quarantine and draconian travel controls would be the only way to prevent a pandemic, and "keeping China offline" for that long might not be politically feasible. In any case, the media have noticed that the total new cases per day for mainland China seem to have become roughly constant over a 3-day period (too soon to consider stable) - which over the next few days may become a more significant case of "become non-accelerating". Boud (talk) 17:21, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

As much as I want to break out the data and build my own model, I remain super cautious of looking at graphs from afar, when so much goes into when cases are reported, etc. See for example [21]... perhaps the rate of confirmed case growth is limited by the testing capacity? maybe the testing capacity for Hubei and non-Hubei have different limits? what explains the growth rate in severe cases? is it just the time lag from past case growth? maybe, but maybe not because severe cases would be tested sooner? or is it that classifying as severe is not testing limited? We're a loooong way away from the front lines. Even well-informed experts make wrong guesses in an event like this. We should encourage our readers to make their own... my two cents anyway. Chris vLS (talk) 07:39, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• 'Non-accelerating' is too generous. You could replace that with something like 'acceleration has slowed down', or that the virus has 'reduced acceleration' due to containment efforts, and not because it's somehow weaker, or less virulent. -Mardus /talk 16:06, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• The second derivative of both the Hubei and non-Hubei total number of officially reported confirmed cases is statistically consistent (by eye) with zero. That can reasonably be described as "non-accelerating", aka as a linear relation. There's no point referring to the third derivative (acceleration slowing down). Testing capacity for 10k/day started trial runs 3 days ago in Wuhan at the Huo-Yan Laboratory, so we should know very soon if a 3k/day testing capacity has been artificially constraining the published data. A lag between confirmed cases and severe cases seems reasonable to me, and capacity for high-quality symptom alleviation care for severe cases is more likely to be constrained then testing capacity. Boud (talk) 17:55, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Let's wait for more in the WP:MEDRS. We shouldn't invite our readers to draw conclusions from this data when the experts looking at this data explicitly say that it is too early to do so. We have two tepid quotes from the WHO [22] but those quotes include "it’s very very early to make any predictions". Other senior public health officials also say things like "it is premature to comment on whether it has slowed down" [23] or "it isn't showing any indications of turning around" [24]. Other experts are saying that it is unlikely to be contained or questioning the data.[25] So let's follow their advice and wait and see. (We don't need to come up with our own vocab for it, we'll use what emerges in the expert community. A Google search for 'non-accelerating coronavirus' gets you links to NAIRU, so that term isn't showing up in the sources yet.) Chris vLS (talk) 20:47, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 6 February 2020

In the last paragraph of the introduction, reference or mention the recent cover of the German newspaper Der Spiegel, which states "Made in China".

References:

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/nation-world/story/2020-02-01/fears-of-new-virus-trigger-anti-china-sentiment-worldwide

https://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1178220.shtml

It might also fit in the 8.4 Disinformation section of the article. 2A01:E0A:D5:D430:30BA:39DE:4B87:BD45 (talk) 23:31, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

 Not done. The SD Tribune barely mentions it, and I wouldn't think anything with a .cn address is reliable. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 23:58, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Is this reliable enough then : http://magazin.spiegel.de/SP/2020/6/ ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E0A:D5:D430:30BA:39DE:4B87:BD45 (talk) 00:10, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Still  Not done. I probably wasn't clear with my reasoning. The point I wanted to get across is that this isn't noteworthy enough to include in the article. The only independent, reliable source you've provided was the SD Tribune, which is barely a passing mention. If someone discusses Der Spiegel's coverage in significant detail, then maybe it could be added, but I don't know what your request does to improve the article. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 00:30, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Ok thank you for the explanation. I thought you were making two points: one about the mere mention of it in the SD Tribune article, and the other about the non reliability of sources ending with .cn, and that you came to the "not done" conclusion specifically because of the combination of the two, not because of various cumulative reasons.

I had never thought about non reliability by default of Chinese media but I am not completely familiar with the Wikipedia rules about credibility of news sources. I would have taken it not to be a matter of personal preferences, though. EDIT: there happens to be a lot of sources in this article ending in .cn, so it is not clear which ones should be considered independent and reliable, and which ones shouldn't. I am setting the request back to not answered until this point can be clarified. 2A01:E0A:D5:D430:845B:9490:1929:437 (talk) 16:33, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

There seemed to be a case to include content about racist reactions and smearing of China in this article, so I suggested to possibly add the Spiegel "Made in china" cover. I agree that the cover itself has not been "covered in significant detail" yet though it has been mentioned in at leat one independent, reliable source, and possibly two, which still needs clarification. - 2A01:E0A:D5:D430:30BA:39DE:4B87:BD45 (talk) 01:08, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Deacon Vorbis's explanation remains true: Despite the cover image, unless other WP:RS make a significant mention of it, it is not notable enough for inclusion. Please refrain from altering the "answered" parameter unless you have new sources to bring forward. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 17:22, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

The lead presently has near the end Xenophobia and racism against people of Chinese and East Asian descent has arisen as a result of the outbreak, with fear and hostility occurring in several countries.[43][44][45][46]. The lead is already very long, and this sentence in the lead quite clearly says that xenophobia has arisen and points the reader to the main article on the topic in this context. New content can be added to that article in an appropriate place. Boud (talk) 17:29, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Three points from me. First, I agree in general with the comments and explanations made by other editors here, and I think Boud in particular points out that the fact of xenophobia based on this outbreak actually already is being given prominence through inclusion in the lead. Second, I think there is a argument to be made for a subsection giving a brief overview on said xenophobia (probably under "Impacts" at the end of the article) - as I've pointed out below though, I won't be doing that, at least not in the next couple days - sorry (you might try opening a new edit request making my point - or sign up, and come aboard this somewhat questionable enterprise, and go for it yourself :P).

Finally, and I'm not trying to come to "Der Spiegels" defence here, but my interpretation of the image / title+subtitle combination is that "Made in China" here primarily stands for Globalisation, with the fact that virus originated in a Chinese city obviously being an intended point as well, but not as in "The virus that China produced/ unleashed on the world". But I can understand that you and others take issue with it as well! Regards Sean Heron (talk) 23:53, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I wouldn't be opposed to a section on it, best organized under #Impact or #Reactions, as its notable enough in coverage by RS to warrant equivalent treatment here to the topic of #Disinformation which also has a sub-section (and also a spinoff article too apparently as per today). Sleath56 (talk) 18:32, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

First Canadian Case Recovered

Since I don't really know how to use wikis for editing and will probably break the page, I did find https://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/canada-news-pmn/new-coronavirus-outbreak-affects-tourism-in-canada-as-confirmed-cases-in-china-climb basically the first person is recovering at home and is discharged from the hospital. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2607:FEA8:9620:365F:2138:65CF:E9F5:612D (talk) 00:02, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I apologise for a slice of dyslexia. Golly gosh. Factrules (talk) 04:15, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

'is recovering' is not equal to 'has recovered'. -Mardus /talk 16:10, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Add section on treatments?

I noticed that there isn't a section on treatment, perhaps that can be added together with recovery of patients (if there are any notable ones). There is a section on vaccine development, but treatment with antiviral drugs is only mentioned in passing. I read that there is some success with such drugs, also some mixed results. Hzh (talk) 10:49, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I would also welcome that. WikiHannibal (talk) 11:36, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I would assume this can be added under the epidemiology section? Hzh (talk) 14:06, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Note that any content on treatment has to meet WP:MEDRS standards. Bondegezou (talk) 16:43, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Anything added would likely to similar to 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease#Treatment research, and since there isn't any one specific treatment yet, it would be more of a general description of what the doctors are doing, an expansion of what's mentioned in the lead. Hzh (talk) 09:49, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@Hzh and WikiHannibal: It's not that there's no "specific treatment"; there's currently "no treatment" in the Wikipedia sense of medical source standards WP:MEDRS. Instead, at the moment there are medical actions that relieve symptoms (antibiotics against bacterial co-infections, anti-virals which might have an effect, fever reduction medications), and there is research into treatments and vaccines. At the moment, there are subsections of two different pages: 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease#Treatment research and Novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV)#Vaccine research. But you (Hzh) seem to be proposing more description of what "medications are being given for symptom alleviation and speculative therapeutic effects". So you seem to be proposing a subsection on this page or another one regarding (1) symptom alleviation medications that are being applied and (2) speculative treatments. I'm not really convinced that there would be much support for (2). Information on randomized controlled trials that are underway would be useful to add to 2019-nCoV acute respiratory disease#Treatment research (or the vaccine research section, as appropriate), but "these doctors tried this and that in an uncontrolled non-research way" is anectodal rather than encyclopedic information. (1) symptom alleviation probably doesn't need much more content: the symptoms are similar to those of pneumonia in general and symptom alleviation methods apparently standard. Boud (talk) 17:08, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

So what do you think of the content that is already written in the other article? The "no specific treatment" part is simply what many official health organisations said. I don't think this article can say anything more than a description of what the health professionals are doing - the article is about an event involving a disease, not an article about the disease itself. Hzh (talk) 00:41, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Death Rate By Region

The death rate is being reported at 2% but death rate is a lagging indicator. Example Wuhan the source of the infection should be the most accurate when calculating death rate. Here we have CoronaVirus Death Rate running at 4.11% on 478 dead from 11,618 cases. This is a very large and oldest sample size and is larger than the sample size that was used on SARS and various other infectious diseases. Without being alarming I think at minimum we should report death rate by Region as many regions are not reporting any deaths. https://ncov.dxy.cn/ncovh5/view/pneumonia 104.158.189.50 (talk) 14:17, 7 February 2020 (UTC) There are a large number of regions reporting zero or very few deaths. Some have over 1000 cases. This maybe impacting the overall number artificially bringing the death rate down. Of the first 99 patients who had the virus 11 died. This is 11% fatality rate. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30211-7/fulltext — Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.41.87.7 (talk) 16:52, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I've been thinking about death rate recently, and you have very many complicating factors (some of which you point out). To point out the three I think are most relevant (no published basis for this, just my own reasoning):

• Typically with infectious diseases, as an epidemic grows, the lethality goes down. This is due to the fact that the most virulent strains are killing their hosts so quickly that they can't infect that many people (vs longer lasting and "under the radar" lesser sypmtom variants). (So you typically have selection for less lethal variants - evolution at work!)
• Lethality is not a direct function of virulence of the pathogen, but the virulence in combination with the treatment that is provided (to be precise, and the state of the immune system / general pre-infection health of patients as well). For the most extreme contrast, in Wuhan the health system is obviously overwhelmed. I think its fair to assume that patients are not being provided optimal care/treatment. In pretty much all the other countries with cases, you have just a handful, or at most a couple dozen cases requiring treatment (hardly a strain on the health systems), and that treatment is therefore likely close to the optimum. So you see how this might contribute to the different lethality rates reported for within Wuhan/Hubei vs the rest of China / rest of the world.
• As the death rate is basiclly "overall number of cases" / "number of case deaths", its heavily dependent on the number of cases reported. Again, in Wuhan, there are likely to be many cases that have not been diagnosed (plus of course, the asymtomatic cases!) (balancing this to an extent is that the number of deaths is likely also underreported...). In many other countries, after non-Chinese nationals were brought by their governments to the country they are citizens of, they were quarantined and / or tested for the virus, and so even asymtomatic cases were registered! (This has been pointed out elsewhere on this talk page I think).

Ok, so much for my thinking for now - hope that's helpful! Regards Sean Heron (talk) 23:16, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

We wikipedia editors don't calculate the death rate ourselves, for a few reasons. First, it is not as simple as just dividing 478 deaths by 11,000 cases. Some of those cases are too recent to be included in the denominator. Calculating the death rate requires looking at cohorts who have had the disease the same about of time. There are other complications as well. Most importantly, however, Wikipedia is not a place for original research. We present the consensus as found in reliable sources. If you find published sources with a higher death rate, we should think about how to include them. Chris vLS (talk) 07:57, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Diamond Princess

I suggest indicating it as 25 (+61) rather than the present 25 (86), which basically counts the 25 Japanese cases twice.Menah the Great (talk) 14:37, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

I am really super interested in this case and seeing how this changes all the time in the table/template. I read that people have been taken to local hospitals, so they are on Japanese soil now, correct? (talk). —Preceding undated comment added 20:11, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

The ship is registered in the United Kingdom. Should the patients be counted as a subset of the UK's count since it is legally British territory?Jaxjaxlexie (talk) 07:34, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

No. They're in Japan. Bondegezou (talk) 11:49, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Citations out of control

Virtually every sentence in this article has a citation tagged to the end of it, which makes for a less than pleasant reading experience.

Is there any way we can consolidate some of these citations to the end of paragraphs, rather than at the end of every sentence?

Also, perhaps we can minimize the citations in the introduction, as much of the introduction information is often repeated later in other sections and then is cited again. See the intro for Donald Trump as an example of what I’m talking about. Ganymede94 (talk) 20:07, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Per WP:INTEGRITY, citations should be placed close to the material they support (i.e. at the end of sentences). Reducing citations in the lead could be possible though. Darylgolden^(talk) Ping when replying 06:38, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree with above. Also, in this era of fake news, and with a subject filled with paranoia, misinformation, and erroneous assumptions, all of which can be easily transmitted through widespread, fast and convenient internet access without risk of social suicide caused by being glued to a device for hours on end, i have this feeling that lots of citations are necessary to reveal and spread the truth. Pancho507 (talk) 07:54, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

The citations in the lead can be trimmed considerably - citations there are generally not necessary since the lead is meant to be summary of what's already in the article. Within the body of article itself, it is possible to bundle citations, but not practicable for now since the situation is fluid (people are still adding/removing/adjusting content heavily), so citations after the sentence is preferable. I would however suggest trimming citations where there are too many of them after a single sentence per WP:OVERCITE. There is one sentence supported by 9 citations, and that is excessive. Hzh (talk) 10:02, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Nine citations for a single sentence is almost certainly overcitation. But in general I agree with @Darylgolden and Pancho507:: compression of citations has to be done carefully, so that the burden on the reader who wishes to check claimed facts against references is not increased. Sometimes overzealous citation compressors make changes with the result that the claimed facts are no longer justified in the revised text, or the reader is forced to read through several citations because they're all bunched together. As for the lead, unless there is broad consensus to de-reference it like in the Trump case, I don't think that would be wise. The sentences in a summary can generally be supported by repeat references that summarise well. In any case, anyone willing to compress references seriously in the lead should preferably do it in small enough steps that others can agree/disagree with/fix individual edits. Boud (talk) 17:19, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Maybe this has never come up on WP before, but may I propose that if the number of citations on individual sentences is becoming overwhelming, then a new feature could be implemented that will default to hiding long sequences of citations, with a little box that can be clicked for readers interested in viewing them.
This would be in the same spirit as the [show]/[hide] 'links' that are sometimes used on certain sections (e.g. mathematical proofs, theoretical justifications, some information boxes) on WP already. Probably there's not really any reason to implement a 'hide' feature.

This would look something like the following:

DEFAULT: "This virus was first publicly reported on by Xi^[11]. Since that initial report, international agencies have produced numerous reports and other updates^{[show citations]}.

EXPANDED: "This virus was first publicly reported on by Xi^[11]. Since that initial report, international agencies have produced numerous reports and other updates^{[12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20]}.

—DIV (1.129.110.141 (talk) 06:42, 9 February 2020 (UTC))

Unconfirmed deaths in North Korea

DailyNK reports that according to internal sources, five people in the Sinuiju area have died from disease with symptoms similar to those of NCoV. The reports are unconfirmed, is this worth mentioning somehow? - ☣Tourbillon ^A ? 22:50, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

i believe that we should wait for more reliable and trustworthy news sources to pick it up and confirm it. Pancho507 (talk) 08:02, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

The closed nature of the country means that it's unlikely to ever get official confirmation though. - ☣Tourbillon ^A ? 08:34, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@Tourbillon:Idk then. Has a version in korean, and source has its own wikipedia article so maybe it should be added. I don't want to have someone remove it though, because daily NK is the only available source. BTW, the daily NK wikipedia article seems to have an italicized name, so wikilinks don't work. Pancho507 (talk) 09:18, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@Pancho507: I’m disagree, DailyNK is a South Korean pro-US newspaper, so maybe the information about North Korea is a propaganda published by the US. We should wait for WHO or UN reports. Nguyen QuocTrung (talk) 17:14, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

DailyNK is in South Korea all right, but it's being run by people who fled from North Korea, and as far as I know, is not financed by the Republic of Korea government, but through donations. Wanting to be free is universal, not 'pro-US'. -Mardus /talk 23:12, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

@Night Lantern: has removed the confirmed status for the DPRK from the map, and I would concur - any and all South Korean sources are pure anti-Korean propaganda - it is relevant here because North Koreans seem to be rising from the "dead" quite often.--Adûnâi (talk) 08:13, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

@Adûnâi: The reason I revert my edit can be seen on Trung talkpage. Thanks.  Ṉight Ḻantern ^🏮 09:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Putin and Trump images

I have had a request to remove the images of Putin and Trump from the article, with reason given that the article is not political. Rather than just changing the page, I would like to hear if others think it is a good idea to keep or remove the images. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 04:11, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• Agree with removal on undue weight grounds. If there are free images of the meeting of Tedros with Xi, or similar, then that might be useful. Espresso Addict (talk) 04:30, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• I also agree Ganymede94 (talk) 05:18, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• I received a message to remove them as well, but I have no strong objection to them being there. The images show nothing more than that international leaders are concerned about crisis to discuss it. I think however the image of Putin can be removed since there isn't any particular noteworthy about the Russians' response, and can be replaced by another one such as the highly publicised one of WHO director general with Xi or image of another affected country if they are available. The Trump image might be worth keeping because he is mentioned in the text, also the travel ban imposed by the US has caused some ructions with the Chinese government. The travel ban may be worth mentioning if it is not mentioned already. Hzh (talk) 10:41, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

  In that case, if there is a photo of trump in airport standing in front of a plane, it can be used. Otherwise, no to trump the impeached president. —usernamekiran (talk) 11:04, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Why use a random image instead of one that deals specifically with the crisis? Hzh (talk) 14:01, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

• I agree with Espresso Addict. —usernamekiran (talk) 11:04, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• Yeah, it seems to be off-topic. Voting for removal. --91.207.170.251 (talk) 15:09, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• Agree with removal, as the images' presence would give undue influence. Putin and Trump have very little to do with a virus that originated in China. -Mardus /talk 16:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• Agree with removal the meetings are not a notable event, nor do they add much context for the reader to understand the reaction. Chris vLS (talk) 20:52, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• Agree No strong opinion either way but certainly no objection. - Wikmoz (talk) 22:08, 8 February 2020 (UTC)
• Agree with removing the images. But I would leave the captions in the main text to note that the virus has been a concern on a national level. Cheater no1 (talk) 02:13, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

"Confirmed cases" graph is misleading

At the moment there is a graph with "Confirmed cases (orange), deaths (red) and recoveries (blue)". It is misleading to draw a graph like that, since confirmed cases includes deaths and recoveries. So the same people are being countered under different colours. It would be better to have a graph of "Deaths (red), recoveries (blue), and confirmed cases (all)". (This is assuming that confirmed cases is defined as number of people ever confirmed to have the virus, as in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_SARS_outbreak#/media/File:2003_Probable_cases_of_SARS_-_Worldwide.svg.) CSMR (talk) 12:27, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Diamond Princess cite

"The cruise ship Diamond Princess is currently quarantined in Japanese waters and managed by the Japanese government. However WHO classifies the cases as "Cases on an international conveyance" and distinguishes them from Japan, although some sources include the cases in the Japanese count."

"although some sources include the cases in the Japanese count"

What are "some sources"?

Citation needed!--Econ2018 (talk) 13:24, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

 Note: I've modified the excessively long section title and moved it into the body of the section to avoid the excessive size of the TOC formatting. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 19:00, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

One of the main sources we use includes it with a "^*" https://bnonews.com/index.php/2020/02/the-latest-coronavirus-cases/ . Also DXY.Some sources are not independent of the Japanese Government, eg WHO, so they will follow their members desires for reporting, and some other sources are independent. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 20:53, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

A US citizen dead on Chinese soil

Should he be counted as an "American death"? It's so weird to consider any non-American American citizens "Americans" in the first place, but his death on Chinese soil complicates matters even further. Link.--Adûnâi (talk) 15:00, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

It is conceptually deceiving if a death is put under America. The American health care system didn't treat the citizen, so if a death is put under America, it would be lowering the actual successfulness in the American health care system. This actually might cause panic because people consider America to have top-tier healthcare. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dannelsluc (talk • contribs) 15:45, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Right, American health care... It still brings into question the US' actions "to ensure the safety of Americans in China and to aid in the evacuation of those who want to leave" (NYT). In any case, a footnote would suffice if necessary (wherever it is placed). --Cold Season (talk) 19:55, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Not sure what is meant by: counted as American death. There are columns for region where death occurred, not citizenship. For example the death in the Philippines was a Chinese national. If you want to propose, can discuss an additional table based on nationality. Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 20:17, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

"region where death occurred" I think some form of that descriptive detail is worth noting that in the table, right in front of the "As of 15 November 2024" part. --Cold Season (talk) 20:19, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Done. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template%3A2019%E2%80%9320_Wuhan_coronavirus_data&type=revision&diff=939803310&oldid=939800463   Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 20:34, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Probably not, because as far as I can tell none of the official figures are themselves separated by nationality and the situation is still developing. This is very different from a plane crash where all the deaths and their nationalities are a matter of airline record, and where the deaths are all part of a discrete incident (or closely related discrete incidents). Thus, starting to break things down by nationality within a table would be misleading. Better to mention it textually if it merits a mention per WP:WEIGHT. I could see it being reasonable to put an explanatory footnote on a table making clear that the deaths are sorted by jurisdiction rather than nationality of the person. But I really don't think it's a good idea to have a table based on nationality at this point. Information is just too sketchy and it's not our role to synthesize those together from the possibly hundreds of sources that state various numbers. You'll very likely wind up with figures that add up to a number larger than the reported death toll, even with 100% accurate numbers, because there'll probably be dual citizens in the mix.

Put briefly, this isn't a plane crash, and as such the typical practice for plane crash articles to list nationalities isn't appropriate here. 199.66.69.88 (talk) 20:20, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Plagues do not care about citizenship. What matters is the location of the patient: where they acquired the disease, potential transmission, and care of the patient.

"Plague Inc and Infection Chart"

Ok, here me out. If we change the colors of the infections from orange to red, and deaths to black. It may actually be more easy to read. This is entirely cosmetic and is 100% not needed. Just a thought. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dannelsluc (talk • contribs) 15:49, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 February 2020

Please add a section that tracks the rate of growth outside of China. On the 29th there were 83 cases. 11 days later, there are over 300. The number of cases outside of China has doubled, twice in 10 days. This seems important. Thank you. 50.43.46.87 (talk) 15:58, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

 Not done. Edit requests are for requests to make specific, precise edits, not general pleas for article improvement. More specifically, in this case, if you want to add a section via an edit request, you need to provide the exact full text that you want to add, complete with references. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 17:31, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Recoveries

How are people recovering if there is no vaccine or medical drug available for this virus yet. I'm really confused — Preceding unsigned comment added by 111.119.185.38 (talk) 18:51, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

The same way they get over the flu or other infection. The body's immune system learns to recognize the disease and counter it.

—WWoods (talk) 19:16, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

The mortality rate for this coronavirus is below 10%, and people do have an immune system. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pestilence Unchained (talk • contribs) 09:42, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Extend Box in Key in [Map of 2019-nCoV cases in mainland China]

Where it says 1000-9999, the 9 is hanging off the box a little bit. Looks a bit weird, so if anyone can fix it, that would be great.Dannelsluc (talk) 19:24, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

World Dream

Are the infected World Dream passengers included in the Hong Kong figure? If so, should they be broken out like those on the Diamond Princess?
—WWoods (talk) 21:49, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

As of 13 hours ago, there were no confirmed infections on the World Dream. The ship is in quarantine because passengers that disembarked on Jan. 24 have been diagnosed with coronavirus after leaving, and authorities are trying to determine if anyone still on the ship may have been infected. Dragons flight (talk) 23:21, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

A new table for cases outside China

The number of cases outside of China (not mainland) seem to be doubling every day. I think it would be interesting to see how this compares to cases in China, where it seems like infection rates are greatly slowing down... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kaisersauce1 (talk • contribs) 23:48, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Quarantine vs. travel restrictions vs. outdoor restrictions?

The lead section has a total of people under "travel restrictions". There is a table of cities under "quarantine" that just includes Hubei cities. And there is a set of cities with "outdoor restrictions." I have questions...

• Is there a clear difference between the three? Is not being allowed to go outside except once per two days really different from a quarantine?
• How should we summarize them in the lead?
• Should the tables be combined?

Thanks Chris vLS (talk) 00:05, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

update deaths

chart says one figure - yet total does not equal that. Please update chinese figure so it does. Deaths section says less than chart. Can these be made a rolling update? John Hopkins says 813: https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6 and if we took it directly from here would be more updated and accurate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.115.204.102 (talk) 05:02, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

More of it: Total recoveries is 2736, which summaries from the regions and countries that is followed below as of now in same site.

• Hubei, Mainland China: 1447
• Zhejiang, Mainland China: 185
• Hunan, Mainland China: 164
• Henan, Mainland China: 136
• Guangdong, Mainland China: 126
• Jiangxi, Mainland China: 72
• Anhui, Mainland China: 68
• Jiangsu, Mainland China: 61
• Sichuam, Mainland China: 60
• Shandong, Mainland China: 51
• Shanghai, Mainland China: 44
• Chongqing, Mainland China: 39
• Beijing, Mainland China: 37
• Hebei, Mainland China: 30
• Fujian, Mainland China: 26
• Shaanxi, Mainland China: 25
• Shanxi, Mainland China: 21
• Guangxi, Mainland China: 18
• Yunnan, Mainland China: 17
• Hainan, Mainland China: 15
• Gansu, Mainland China: 13
• Heilongjiang, Mainland China: 13
• Ninxia, Mainland China: 13
• Liaoning, Mainland China: 8
• Guizhou, Mainland China: 7
• Inner Mongolia, Mainland China: 5
• Jilin, Mainland China: 5
• Tianjin, Mainland China: 4
• Qinghai, Mainland China: 3
• Macau, China: 1
• Taiwan, The separated chinese region: 1

I included only Taiwan as a other country/region in this list of recovered chinese regions. They really need to update it thought. But they are updated deaths already, so i have to place it here anyway if someone want it. 91.207.170.251 (talk) 07:14, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Incorrect grammar

Can the article please be edited to remove incorrect references to "the coronavirus". It is often wrongly treated in the general media as though the virus is called "Corona", so that we would erroneously talk about a "Corona virus and a Measles virus".

The summary is that "coronavirus" should be used grammatically in the same way as "influenza" or "measles".

CORRECT: "There has been an outbreak of coronavirus/influenza."
INCORRECT: "There has been an outbreak of the coronavirus/influenza."
INCORRECT: "There has been an outbreak of the corona virus."
INCORRECT: "There has been an outbreak of corona."

CORRECT: "There has been a coronavirus/measles outbreak."

CORRECT: "Many people are concerned about the coronavirus/measles outbreak." (Used attributively.)

CORRECT: "The influenza/measles virus is quite contagious."
CORRECT: "The coronavirus virus is quite contagious." (Although it sounds sounds weird.)

Inserting "novel" doesn't change the above rules.

Current examples of incorrect grammar in the article include:

• "Misinformation spread primarily online about the coronavirus has led the WHO to declare an "infodemic" on 2 February.[45]"
• "Chinese scientists were able to isolate a strain of the coronavirus "
• "social media posts deemed to hold negative tones about the coronavirus"
• "The CDC has directed U.S. Customs and Border Protection to check individuals for symptoms of the coronavirus."
• "Jinyintan Hospital had initially been tasked with treating those with the coronavirus."
• "On 30 January, US President Donald Trump received a briefing on the Coronavirus in China."

And so on.

Exception: incorrect grammar (or spelling) within quotations should generally be retained. For example:
"US President Donald Trump thanked Chinese President Xi Jinping "on behalf of the American People" on 24 January 2020 on Twitter, stating that "China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency" and declaring that "It will all work out well."[391]" (Emphasis added.)
Other options are to edit the text explicitly, or to add a note:
"stating that "China has been working very hard to contain [coronavirus].""
or
"stating that "China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus [sic].""

—DIV (1.129.110.141 (talk) 07:05, 9 February 2020 (UTC))

Another exception is if the strain/type of coronavirus has been specified earlier in the text.

Example:

CORRECT: "The Spanish laboratory cultured specimens obtained from a dozen patients, from which five viruses were identified, including coronavirus and measles. The coronavirus [that was cultured in that laboratory] was found to be killed by disinfectants X and Y."

—DIV (1.129.110.141 (talk) 07:12, 9 February 2020 (UTC))

This article should reflect common usage by reliable sources. So, we have The Hague as a non-standard usage of "the" and if usage regarding this virus also uses "the", then so should Wikipedia. We should not be grammar pedants. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 07:18, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

PRC Government issues new name for the virus

N.C.P. - Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia

There has been reports that the PRC Government has coined a new name for the virus. However, an official name has yet to be chosen by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses.

NYT Coronavirus Live Updates

I will leave it to others on how and where this might be included in this page. Ozcloudwarrior (talk) 08:34, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 9 February 2020

2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak → 2019–20 novel coronavirus outbreak – Current page title is disturbing to remain and there are 2 highly known sources refer this virus as Novel coronavirus. Regice2020 (talk) 08:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

References

_

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME and WP:NCEVENTS#Conventions. Until we have an official name for the virus, I am afraid the current title is the best we can do. (That is ignoring the cumbersome options of 2019–20 outbreak of 2019 novel coronavirus or 2019–20 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak, in light of the virus being named 2019 novel coronavirus.)--- C&C (Coffeeandcrumbs) 09:05, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Refuted Per WP:COMMONNAME - CDC and World Health Organization set the virus name as Novel coronavirus - not Wuhan coronavirus.Regice2020 (talk) 09:22, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

CDC calls it 2019 Novel Coronavirus or 2019-nCoV. Same for WHO. That is not the same as Novel coronavirus which the name of any new coronavirus, not just this one that was discovered in 2019. --- C&C (Coffeeandcrumbs) 09:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME. The adjective "novel" doesn't tell you anything about the virus. How novel should a coronavirus be to be called a novel coronavirus? What if scientists discover another coronavirus during the same period of time? "More novel coronavirus"? Lysimachi (talk) 09:27, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is some evidence that the virus could circulate indefinitely, like flu, so the inclusion of the 2020 date is problematic to me - unsigned 09:34, 9 February 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.151.81.27 (talk)
• Oppose. Novel will soon be out of date, as in this context it just means "new". WHO is using "novel" because there is no established name yet, but this will have an established name soon enough. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pestilence Unchained (talk • contribs) 09:45, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
• Comment. This strain won't be "novel" for long. Colin Gerhard (talk) 10:04, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
• Comment This must be the quickest re-request to move I have seen after the last one closed. I would have thought waiting a period first to see if anything changes before requesting it again is the appropriate thing to do. Hzh (talk) 10:39, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
• Speedy close - The move discussion was recent close by User:QEDK [26] at 07:59, 9 February 2020. Why people are opening it again? Just wait a time till we get a more stable name. Carlosguitar ^{(Yes Executor?)} 11:30, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
• Speedy close on procedural grounds - see Talk:2019–20 Wuhan coronavirus outbreak#Requested move 2 February 2020 which was just closed as no consensus a few hours ago. Wait at least a month (or for WHO to publish an official name) before any new rename proposals. Boud (talk) 11:48, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
• Comment Not this again. What's new from current event, and whose answers are unique from the last week? --91.207.170.251 (talk) 12:08, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Japan divides infected into people with symptoms, and without.

So about one week ago, Japanese numbers of infected showed it as a sum of two numbers like this 94(26+68) with a sidenote stating Japanese divides infected into non-symptomatic and symphonic, however, this sidenote is gone now, leaving people confused about why there is this addition next to the number of infected — Preceding unsigned comment added by Deathcounter (talk • contribs) 11:38, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

The +68 means the number of cases from 'Diamond Princess' ship, that's why. --91.207.170.251 (talk) 12:25, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Persistence of coronaviruses on inanimate surfaces and its inactivation with biocidal agents

Persistence of coronaviruses on inanimate surfaces and its inactivation with biocidal agents

Can someone add the information please?

We therefore reviewed the literature on all available information about the persistence of human and veterinary coronaviruses on inanimate surfaces as well as inactivation strategies with biocidal agents used for chemical disinfection, e.g. in healthcare facilities. The analysis of 22 studies reveals that human coronaviruses such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) coronavirus, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) coronavirus or endemic human coronaviruses (HCoV) can persist on inanimate surfaces like metal, glass or plastic for up to 9 days, but can be efficiently inactivated by surface disinfection procedures with 62-71% ethanol, 0.5% hydrogen peroxide or 0.1% sodium hypochlorite within 1 minute. Other biocidal agents such as 0.05-0.2% benzalkonium chloride or 0.02% chlorhexidine digluconate are less effective. As no specific therapies are available for 2019-nCoV, early containment and prevention of further spread will be crucial to stop the ongoing outbreak and to control this novel infectious thread.

https://www.journalofhospitalinfection.com/article/S0195-6701(20)30046-3/fulltext

--80.187.106.5 (talk) 12:25, 9 February 2020 (UTC)