“Once the central government’s propaganda mission to win the ‘people’s war’ against the virus became clear, numbers shifted to achieve that vision,” the newspaper noted.
“Such shifts would probably be subtle – not hundreds or thousands of hidden deaths, but instead excluding deaths that could be attributed to other types of pneumonia or heart failure, for instance.”
Reacting to the US intelligence report today, Republican Senator Ben Sasse dismissed China’s figures as “garbage propaganda”.
“The claim that the United States has more coronavirus deaths than China is false,” Mr Sasse said.
“Without commenting on any classified information, this much is painfully obvious – the Chinese Communist Party has lied, is lying and will continue to lie about coronavirus to protect the regime.”
