Lockdowns, draconian quarantines where people are treated horribly, business closures, billions spent on mass PCR tests...
To what end really?
Certainly, some people got crazy rich out of this. Hence allegations of fake test results by the test companies. I bet those people already secured Canadian or US residency.
What's the end result? A weak, unimmunized population on the cusp of a probably equally chaotic, scary opening up, which will disrupt business equally badly as lockdowns and quarantines.
Making fun of the US, India and the rest of the world for their rational choices may have helped the Party score points. But, it won't help regular people.
China should have walked with the world, not against it. Who really admires, or even distantly remembers, Chinese Dream now?
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Researchers have analysed how many deaths the country could see if it pivots to a full reopening. Read more at straitstimes.com.
www.straitstimes.com
More than 2 million
Zhou Jiatong, head of the Center for Disease Control in southwestern Guangxi region, said last month in a paper published by the Shanghai Journal of Preventive Medicine that mainland China faces more than 2 million deaths if it loosened its Covid-19 curbs in the same way Hong Kong did this year.
Infections could rise to more than 233 million, his forecast showed.
1.55 million
In May, scientists in China and the United States
estimated that China risked just over 1.5 million Covid-19 deaths if it drops its tough zero-Covid-19 policy without any safeguards such as ramping up vaccination and access to treatments, according to research published in Nature Medicine.
They forecasted that peak demand on intensive care would be more than 15 times capacity, causing roughly 1.5 million deaths, based on worldwide data gathered about the variant’s severity.
However, the researchers, the lead authors among whom were from Fudan University in China, said the death toll could be reduced sharply if there was a focus on vaccination.
Up to 2.1 million
China could see 1.3 million to 2.1 million people die if it lifts its zero-Covid-19 policy due to low vaccination and booster rates as well as a lack of hybrid immunity, British scientific information and analytics company Airfinity said on Monday.
The company said it modelled its data on Hong Kong’s BA.1 wave in February, which occurred after the city eased restrictions after two years. REUTERS