After the relaxation of strict Covid-zero measures in China, experts expect a massive wave of infections. The vast majority of China’s 1.4 billion people will eventually contract the coronavirus, according to a government adviser. Former deputy director of the national health agency, Feng Zijian, assumes that 80 to 90% of the population will eventually be infected by the virus, state media reported on Thursday.
“Regardless of how the measures are adjusted, most of us will be infected at some point”, emphasized the expert. In the first wave, the infection rate should reach around 60%, according to the model’s calculations. “Reasonable measures” must be taken to keep the peak of this wave low and ease the burden on public health, Feng Zijian said in an online forum at Beijing’s Tsinghua University. After the recent outbreak in Beijing, hospitals in the capital are already facing a large influx of infected people and staff shortages.
“The emergency room is full of patients,” a nurse told Yicai magazine. “Many patients who come to the ER test positive after a PCR test.” The team must prepare to get infected. An anesthetist at another hospital reported that the definition of a contact person is no longer so narrow there to avoid staff shortages due to necessary isolation.
An essay circulating in medical circles says the next two months will be “the darkest time” for medical staff, the magazine wrote. “Positive patients are piling up in the fever clinic and there are many complications,” said an intensive care physician at the hospital.
The peak of the wave will put “enormous pressure” on the medical system, warned expert Feng Zijian. Preparations would have to be made. It is also important to speed up vaccination – especially for elderly people with chronic diseases. Anyone who is not fully vaccinated should do so as soon as possible. The expert was among eight experts who advised Deputy Prime Minister Sun Chunlan last week, before Chunlan spoke of a “new stage” in the fight against the virus, which is now “less pathogenic”.
After a wave of protests in late November against draconian Covid-19 measures, the government backtracked on Wednesday and announced a comprehensive easing of lockdowns, quarantine rules, mandatory testing and travel in China. In principle, it should be possible for infected people without symptoms or with a mild course of the disease to be isolated at home. Even contact persons are no longer threatened with the quarantine camp as before. They must also be able to isolate themselves at home.
The obligation to carry out frequent PCR tests and the constant control of the Corona app for scanning should also be relaxed. Beijing authorities continued to require a negative test within the last 48 hours from visitors on Thursday. In any case, many restaurants, shops and schools in the capital remain closed, while many employees work from home.
For travel within China, however, a negative test and proof of safety via the Corona app will no longer be required in the future. The lockdowns must only be imposed on individual buildings, floors or residences – and no longer “arbitrarily” extended to entire neighborhoods or streets, as the government has ordered.
Rather than wanting to bring the number of infections to zero with strict measures, China will likely try to live with the virus like the rest of the world with these easing. The Covid-zero strategy has caused widespread popular discontent and huge tensions in the second largest economy, while strict measures against the new, easily transmissible omicron variants of the virus have become less and less effective.
International health experts have repeatedly expressed their incomprehension that modern foreign mRNA vaccines have not yet been approved in China. It was also warned that natural immunity among billions of people still does not exist, as there have been relatively few infections in China so far. For many Chinese, it has been a long time since the last vaccines or boosters, which can become a problem.