Clarence Page: ‘Satisfying’ That Azar Visit Will ‘Reassure Taiwan’ That We’re Still With Them

On Friday’s broadcast of “The McLaughlin Group,” Chicago Tribune columnist Clarence Page praised Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar’s planned visit to Taiwan, citing the differences between how Taiwan and China handled the coronavirus outbreak in its early stage, China’s continued lack of transparency about the early days of the coronavirus outbreak, and the fact that China intentionally hid how bad the coronavirus situation was. Page also stated that it is “always rather satisfying to reassure Taiwan that we’re still here, we’re still with you.”

Page began by stating that the differences between how Taiwan handled the early days of the coronavirus outbreak and how China handled the early days of the coronavirus outbreak are “a big reason” for Azar’s visit to Taiwan.

He continued, “There’s a lot of explaining that China hasn’t done yet, insofar as what happened early on. They did, to some degree, deliberately suppress how serious the situation was. We had a lot of issues with China, health care being one of them — or pandemic control being one of them. The other is, it’s always rather satisfying to reassure Taiwan that we’re still here, we’re still with you.”

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