I think the Chinese government & media are worse than the US when it comes to lying to the public. Journalists there dissapeare all the time if you believe watchdog groups. On Chinese New Years, Saturday January 25th my family had dinner with a Chinese family who are family friends of ours. Our daughters go to school together & are best friends. This was when the Coronavirus was still back page news. They brought the subject up, I thought it awkward & wasn’t the least bit worried. He is a no nonsense professor at a large state university & he thought it was very serious. They travel to China often & stay in touch with family there. He said the situation was dire & not to believe anything in the media about the coronavirus. He is somewhat pro-China & even he called his governments media machine liars on the coronavirus. He told us then to stock up on things, especially masks. Turns out what I thought was their irrational fears were well founded. I’m glad we listened to him. I slowly started stocking up on things the next Monday he scared me so much. That was the last time we ate at a sit-down restaurant & will probably be the last for a long time.
The first thread about the coronavirus on Gcaptain forum started on Jan 30 & I was the 2nd commentor on that thread repeating the same story as above. Just goes to show you can sometimes believe crazy people online who sound paranoid.