The Xi Jinping-like controversy over the zero Covid-19 epidemic: The case of a squeezing protester in Singapore

Many people across the country expressed their unease with the rapid change. Even after much of the world relaxed pandemic restrictions, China continued to lock down entire cities and send all Covid-19 patients to central quarantine facilities, while restricting others merely for visiting an area where a positive case was detected.

The video of her screaming abuse at the hazmat-suited workers, which was recently uploaded to Weibo, was a testament to the growing anger in the Chinese people over their government’szero- Covid policy.

The woman has been under quarantine for half a year since returning from university in the summer, she shouts at the workers. They stare back, seemingly unmoved.

“The issue is Xi Jinping already associated himself with the ‘successful’ model of fighting Covid, so the zero-Covid policy now is a de facto Xi Jinping policy,” said Alfred Wu, an associate professor at the National University of Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, adding that China’s handling of the virus in comparison to other countries remains a point of national pride for many Chinese.

With less than a week to go before the Communist Party Congress in Beijing and the most important political event in recent history, there is a claim of that, even though there is a new strain of infections circulating.

Observers across the world will be watching the twice-a-decade meeting for signs of the party’s priorities when it comes to its zero-Covid stance, which has been blamed for exacerbating mounting problems in the economy, from stalled growth to a collapsing housing market.

China’s Zero Covid-19: A Demonstration Against the Establishment of a New Zero-Covid Era

There is fear in China’s capital, where online photos posted Thursday appeared to show an unusual public protest against the president. Yes to food if you refuse the Covid test. No to lockdown, yes to freedom. There is no to lie, yes to dignity. Yes, to change, no to cultural revolution. Yes, to vote if you are a great leader. There were banners posted on the overpass that said, “Don’t be a slave, be a citizen.”

The protest site, “Sitong Bridge,” was immediately removed from search results by Weibo. Key words like Beijing,Haidian, warriors,brave man, andcourage were restricted from being searched for.

Several accounts on the social media platform webber have been banned after they commented on the protest.

Many spoke out to show their support. Some people shared a Chinese pop hit that was related to the protester who some called a hero, while others posted under the slogan: “I saw it.”

As the new era of Beijing’s rule starts, the system known as the dynamic zero- Covid policy is facing both social and economic pushback.

The city of 25 million people has already gone on a two-month, world’s strictest lock down, and now authorities are starting to tighten measures again.

Among the estimates cited in both reports, was the revelation that on Tuesday alone, 37 million people were newly infected with Covid-19 across China. That was significantly different to the official number of new infections reported that day.

“I know it’s going to happen,” said Zhang Xiaoying, the deputy director of the regional government of education and the outbreak of Coronavirus in Inner Mongolia

Spooked by the possibility of unpredictable and unannounced snap lockdowns – and mindful that authorities have previously backtracked after suggesting that no such measures were coming – some people in the city have reportedly been hoarding drinking water.

The announcement that the water authorities have taken action to make sure the water is safe has made the panic buying worse.

There’s not a lot of information about why the increase in infections is not clear, even though authorities are scrambling to contain the spread of the coronavirus strain after it was first discovered in China.

The country has seen an increase in cases of domestic tourists, despite the fact that people are discouraged from traveling during China’s Golden Week holiday.

More than 240,000 university students in Inner Mongolia have been locked down on campuses due to the latest outbreak, according to Zhang Xiaoying, a deputy director of the regional Department of Education. The Communist Party boss of the university sacked after 39 students from his institution tested positive for the H1N1 strain of flu, has been at the center of the outbreak.

Then there is the situation in far western Xinjiang, where some 22 million people have been banned from leaving the region and are required to stay home. Xinjiang recorded 403 new cases on Thursday, according to an official tally.

Yet amid it all, Beijing appears unwilling to move from its hardline stance. For three days this week, the state-run Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily published commentaries reiterating that China would not let its guard down.

The battle against Covid was winnable, it said. The countries that had reopened and loosened restrictions, it said, had had no choice but to do so as they had failed to effectively control the epidemic.

The Rise of the Great Wall: High-Redshift Expatriate Travel in China during the Golden Week of October 23rd

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During China’s National Day holiday in early October, several expatriate friends and I took our young children – who are of mixed races and tend to stand out in a Chinese crowd – to the Great Wall on the outskirts of Beijing.

We walked past a few local families as we went down the restored section of the ancient landmark. One of our kids exclaimed “WOW foreigners!” With Covid? Let’s get away from them. The adults stayed quiet as the group moved quickly.

Understanding the big picture is timely as Xi is poised to break convention to assume a third term as the head of the Chinese Communist Party – the real source of his power instead of the ceremonial presidency – at the ruling party’s twice-a-decade national congress, which opened in Beijing on Sunday.

The Great Wall, a top tourist attraction that normally draws throngs of visitors during holidays, was almost completely empty when we went because of the zero Tolerance policy for Covid infections which was implemented by President Xi three years into the global epidemic.

There was an announcement on Monday that will bring the end to the restrictions on foreign visitors to China. Quarantines were reduced last month from seven days to five.

The Omicron variant was raging through parts of the country so authorities discouraged domestic travel ahead of the holiday. They are also sticking to a playbook of strict quarantine, incessant mass testing and invasive contact tracing – often locking down entire cities of millions over a handful of cases.

Unsurprisingly, holiday travel plummeted during the so-called “Golden Week” along with tourism spending, which fell to less than half of that in 2019, the last “normal” year.

The Great Wall, the Great Wall and the QR Codes of the World: China’s Last Rejuvenation and Their Role in the Today’s Daily Life

A Shenzhen hardware tech executive said that the country was falling into an oblivion because of the dictator’s leadership. “But you can’t do anything about it. It pains and depresses me.”

China is trying to shape along with other autocrats like Putin a world order that is dominated by the US. Until that happens, though, the Chinese strongman’s instinct and demand for total control at home seem to have meant the erection of ever-higher barriers – in the real world and cyberspace – to keep out pesky outsiders, the perceived source of dangerous viruses and ideas.

The local child said something about the Great Wall. But the true danger of the “blame the foreigners” sentiment comes when adults in powerful positions take advantage of it in the face of mounting pressure on the domestic front.

A history paper released recently by a government-run research institute has gone viral as it, like Xi, upended a long-held consensus. Instead of denouncing the isolationist policy adopted by China’s last two imperial dynasties as a cause of their backward turn and eventual collapse, the authors defended its necessity to protect national sovereignty and security when faced with Western invaders.

The emperors of those dynasties, who also rebuilt parts of the Great Wall, failed to reverse their country’s decline back then. The tools they had at their disposal were not up to the challenge of the high-tech ones in China. There is a good chance that the walls he built will help him realize his ultimate goal: the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

China has an advanced online platform that is run on mobile phones, and is commonly referred to as the “QR codes of the world”. The technologies play a part in limiting daily life.

The system, which is separate from the health code scanning system still required in a reduced number of places in China, had used people’s cell phone data to track their travel history in the past 14 days in an attempt to identify those who have been to a city with zone designated “high-risk” by authorities.

Across the nation, going to the grocery store, riding public transit or entering an office building depend on holding up to date, negative Covid test and not being flagged as a close contact of a patient.

Going out in public can be a risk in itself, as being placed under quarantine or barricaded by authorities into a mall or office building as part of a snap lockdown could simply depend on whether someone in the general vicinity ends up testing positive.

Li was scrambling to prove that he did not need to wear a prophylactic after a tracking system pinned his wife to a location near to where a positive case occurred, and he lamented about the flaws of big data.

Li, who’d been with his wife at the time but received no such message, said they were eventually able to reach a hotline and explain their situation, ultimately returning her health code to green.

The Rise of Social Controls in the China of the First Five Years of the Party Congress: A Case Study on the Effect of a Zero-Covid Policy

The People’s Daily editorial reads that the party should continue to persist with dynamic zero- Covid because it is necessary to put people first and prioritize life.

A comment about the cost of the policy was removed after it received more than half a million likes.

Last week, a rare political protest in Beijing saw banners hung from a bridge along the capital’s busy Third Ring Road that zoned in on social controls under the policy.

The opening ceremony of the congress was graced by an endorsement from the president that he said had given precedence to the people and their lives above all else. He secured a third term, as well as getting the party’s top ranks to have allies who had carried out his policies.

The effect of those controls is becoming more and more pronounced as they have become more and more common in the last few years, leaving people struggling for food and medicine and grappling with lost income.

In the run up to the Party Congress, controls amplified – as local authorities around the country sought to tamp down on outbreaks coinciding with the major political event.

“Maintaining the zero-Covid strategy is now substantially more costly than it was a year ago, because the latest (viral) strains are so much more transmissible and outbreaks are occurring more frequently,” said epidemiologist Ben Cowling of the University of Hong Kong’s School of Public Health.

For nearly three years, China stuck to its zero-tolerance approach to the virus, even though the policy caused unprecedented economic damage and widespread frustration. Growth slowed dramatically, company profits fell and youth unemployment jumped to an all time high.

After almost three years of focusing on controlling the viruses, China is little prepared for treating the infections. The council’s public health fellow says that measures to protect the elderly, like the vaccine, were “all thrown into a back- burner issue.”

China has not imported any foreign-made vaccines, which are widely seen inside the country to be more effective than China’s homegrown jabs. And data on the Chinese vaccines has been conflicting. The Hong Kong scientists reported that made-in-China Sinovac boosters could prevent serious illness in old people. This month, though, Singapore-based scientists concluded that three or four doses of mRNA vaccines offered better protection for people over 60 than China’s inactivated virus vaccines for COVID-19.

The Councilon Foreign Relations is a senior fellow for global health who said that if you do not see any effort to prepare for the change, that means that they are not planning to change the policy any time soon.

China’s economic woes during the November 2022 pandemic were sharply underwhelmed by COVID-19 and its health codes

The health code system has already been used to diffuse protest, with petitioners who lost their savings in rural banks prevented from protesting after their health codes inexplicably turned red.

China’s exports had been a bright spot for the struggling economy and were one of the few bright spots in October.

Outbound shipments in October were down from a year earlier and well below analysts’ expectations, showing a sharp contrast to the gain in September. The worst performance was in May 2020.

With the country’s manufacturing sector under additional pressure due to persistent COVID-19 curbs, and with the global recession risks growing, any meaningful economic revival will be in serious danger.

Chinese exporters weren’t even able to capitalize on a further weakening in the yuan currency and the key year-end shopping season, underlining the broadening strains for consumers and businesses worldwide.

External trade was also weak. Last week, customs data showed the country’s exports contracted 8.7% in November from a year ago, the worst performance since February 2020. Most economists expected that figure to be higher.

The company said it expects lower-than-anticipated shipments of the high-end iPhones after a production cut at a plant in China.

“Looking forward, we think exports will fall further over the coming quarters. The shift in global consumption patterns that pushed up demand for consumer goods during the pandemic will probably continue to unwind,” said Zichun Huang, economist at Capital Economics.

“We expect one third of the world economy to be in recession,” she said, adding that even for countries that are not in recession: “It would feel like recession for hundreds of millions of people.”

Feeble October factory and trade figures suggested the world’s second-biggest economy is struggling to get out of the mire in the last quarter of 2022, after it reported a faster-than-anticipated rebound in the third quarter.

Top leaders at the Central Economic Work Conference, a key annual meeting that ended Friday, said in a statement that stabilizing economic growth was the top priority for 2023. They also signaled that policymakers would relax their grip on the country’s private sector — a departure from the regulatory crackdown that in recent years has thrown China’s biggest private companies into chaos.

The Economy of China: A View from a Chinese-American Businessman Who Was Depressed at the Communist Party Congress in 1996-980

The overall trade figures resulted in a slightly wider trade surplus of $85.15 billion, compared with $84.74 billion in September, missing a forecast of $95.95 billion.

“When the ability to govern decreases, even in the absence of any particular policy from the top, the ineptitude, brutality, and ignorance of lower-level officials will brew disasters for the common people they rule over,” said Mr. Wu, who is a senior research scholar at the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions.

Many people in the business community have lost money because of zero-covid, which has locked millions of people in their homes as the government tries to get rid of the coronaviruses.

Despite many conversations over the years, we never talked about politics. I was surprised he went to the party congress to talk about his depression. He used to be very patriotic and believed that the Chinese were the most hard working people in the world. He and many of his friends enjoy hiking, golfing and drinking. He said that they were too depressed to work.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/07/business/xi-jinping-china-party-congress.html

A Chilling Text from a Silicon Valley Tech Entrepreneur: The “Zero-COVID” Policy and the Reconciling of China’s Social and Economic Disruption

Until a year ago, his start-up was doing so well that he was planning to take it public. When cities were locked down under the ‘zero- Covid’ rule, he lost a lot of revenue as well as his new hires sat idly with nothing to do. He said now he has no choice but to lay off more than 100 people, sell his business and move his family to North America.

The tech entrepreneurial from Beijing sent me a chilling text after the party congress. He didn’t want his employees to leave work early or stock up on food when there were rumors that Beijing was going to be locked down. He was worried that he could be reported for spreading rumors — something that had gotten people detained by the police. He told them only that they should feel free to leave early if they had things to take care of.

Beijing plans to ease its “dynamic zero COVID” policy by shortening travel rules, changing its monitoring and control regime, and simplifying its quarantine requirements.

During a meeting of the top decision-making body of the Communist Party Friday, leaders pledged to maintain Covid protocols while emphasizing the need to minimize economic and social disruptions.

The zero-tolerance approach has had challenges from highly transmissible new versions, and its heavy economic and social costs have drawn a lot of public backlash.

The easing of the measures will see authorities scrap the so-called “circuit breaker” mechanism, under which China-bound flights were suspended if an airline was found to carry a certain number of passengers who tested positive for Covid upon landing.

Inbound international passengers will also see their pre-departure test requirement reduced from two to one, and their mandatory centralized quarantine upon arrival cut from seven days to five days, followed by another three days of home isolation.

How a Chinese auto dealer saw his father die in lockdown: How he turned to TV to complain about the consequences of Covid-19

Markets responded positively to the changes, but international investors are still jittery. Just after noon, the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong shot up 7%, while the mainland China benchmark Shanghai index rose 2.5%.

Under the new guidelines, people who are identified as close contacts of Covid-19 cases will also have shortened quarantine at centralized government-operated facilities, down from seven days plus another three days at home, to five days and three days at home.

According to Ben Cowling, director of the University of Hong Kong’s epidemiology unit, there is no reason to lift testing for international travellers if the objective is still zero carbon dioxide.

The government reported 10,535 new domestically transmitted cases on Thursday, the highest in months, and the authorities girded for the situation to worsen.

The National Health Commission warned that the epidemic “is likely to further expand in scope and scale” due to mutations and weather factors in the winter and spring.

Zhou, an auto dealer in northeastern China, only saw his father alive in a video chat on the afternoon of November 1 after his home was locked down.

At the time, they didn’t even realize the snap Covid restrictions had been imposed – there was no warning beforehand, and the apartment building where Zhou’s parents and his 10-year-old son lived did not have any cases, he said.

“The local government killed my dad,” Zhou told CNN in his Beijing home, breaking down in tears. He said he’s received no explanation about why the ambulance took so long to arrive, just a death certificate stating the wrong date of death.

Migrant workers abandoned a locked-down Foxconn factory en masse, walking for miles to escape an outbreak at China’s largest iPhone assembling site. A 3-year-old boy died of gas poisoning in lockdown after he was blocked from being taken promptly to a hospital. A 4-month-old girl died in hotel quarantine after a 12-hour delay in medical care.

Zhou tried to get reporters to report on his story but they didn’t show up. Despite knowing the risk of repercussions from the government, he turned to foreign media. CNN is using his name to reduce the risk.

The Zhengzhou and Chongqing Zero-Covid Demonstrations echoed by Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou

In the central city of Zhengzhou this week, workers at the world’s biggest iPhone assembly factory clashed with hazmat-suited security officers over a delay in bonus payment and chaotic Covid rules.

And on Thursday, in the sprawling metropolis of Chongqing in the southwest, a resident delivered a searing speech criticizing the Covid lockdown on his residential compound. “Without freedom, I would rather die!” He shouted to a cheering crowd and wrestled the police officer who tried to take him away from them.

These acts of defiance echoed an outpouring of discontent online, notably from Chinese football fans – many under some form of lockdown or restrictions – who have only been able to watch from home as tens of thousands of raucous fans pack stadiums at the World Cup in Qatar.

“None of the fans are seen wearing face masks, or told to submit proof of Covid test results. Are they not living on the same planet as us?” asked a Wechat article questioning China’s insistence on zero-Covid, which went viral before it was censored.

There are signs that the heavy social and economic tolls inflicted by the widening lockdowns were taking a toll on Chinese officials.

Instead of relaxing controls, many local officials are reverting to the zero-tolerance playbook, attempting to stamp out infections as soon as they flare up.

The northern city of Shijiazhuang was among the first to cancel mass testing. It allowed students to return to schools after a long period of online classes. But as cases rose over the weekend, authorities reimposed a lockdown on Monday, telling residents to stay home.

The financial hub of Shanghai banned anyone from entering certain venues for five days. Authorities also shut down cultural and entertainment venues in half of the city.

In Guangzhou, officials this week extended the lockdown on Haizhu district – where the protest took place – for the fifth time, and locked down its most populous Baiyun district.

In Beijing, streets in its largest district of Chaoyang are largely empty as authorities urged residents to stay home and ordered businesses to shut. Several districts moved to online classes this week.

The City of Beijing: How have the zero-COVID controls affected the state of health? Comment on a Pedestrian’s Experience

Not all public health and medical experts have changed their views. The director of a hospital affiliated with Fudan University said the zero-COVID policy should be loosened even before an outbreak in city shuts down for weeks. That position attracted some online attacks, but is now being praised for speaking truth to power.

Chinese officials have denied that the guidelines listed in them are meant for a pivot to living with the virus.

Back on the outskirts of Beijing, Zhou said while the zero-Covid policy “is beneficial to the majority,” its implementation at a local level had been too draconian.

“I don’t want things like this to happen again in China and anywhere in the world,” he said. “I lost my father. My son’s grandfather passed away. I am angry now.

Some of the signs of China’s zero- Covid controls have been dismantled, health code signs have been taken off the walls of metro stations and some checkpoint have been closed because of the changes to the country’s pandemic policy.

While the changes were greeted with relief by many and sparked discussion online of freer travel within the country – and perhaps even international travel in the future – there was also a sense of uncertainty about what lay ahead.

“The world changed overnight, and that’s really amazing,” said Echo Ding, 30, a manager at a tech company in Beijing. “I feel like we are getting back to normal life. This is important to me because if I don’t get back to a normal life, I might lose my mind.”

How can it change so quickly? Ding asked if he was still alive. It makes me feel like we are not worth anything. It is up to them. It was said that it was good, so I feel like it is. It is so unreal, but I have no choice. All I can do is follow the arrangement.”

David Wang, 33, a freelancer in Shanghai, said although the changes were welcome, they had also sparked a feeling of disbelief in the city, which underwent a chaotic, more than two-month-long, citywide lockdown earlier this year.

He said that most of his friends were showing signs of post-traumatic stress disorder, but they just couldn’t believe it was happening.

What to do if you are infected by Omicron: Beijing’s public opinion of the presidential announcement on December 7 pushed back

Top health officials in Beijing on Wednesday said the changes to the rules were based on scientific evidence, including the spread of the comparatively milder Omicron variant, the vaccination rate, and China’s level of experience in responding to the virus.

Then, on December 7, the central government announced a drastic overhaul of approach, rolling back lockdowns, testing and allowing residents to isolate at home – effectively abandoning zero-Covid.

The government and state media had long emphasized the dangers of the virus and its potential long-term effects – and used this to justify the maintenance of restrictive policies.

While Omicron may cause relatively milder disease compared to earlier variants, even a small number of serious cases could have a significant impact on the health system in a country of 1.4 billion.

On China’s heavily moderated social media platform Weibo, topics and hashtags related to what to do if infected by Omicron trended high on Thursday morning, while there were numerous reports of panic buying of fever medications.

“People were not told what kind of medicine they should have and what they should do if infected until there was widespread infection. The policy release felt sudden and arbitrary, and Sam Wang, a lawyer in Beijing, said that it should have been done a long time ago.

Bob Li, a graduate student in Beijing, who tested positive for the viruses on Friday, said he wasn’t afraid of the virus, but his mother was worried because she lives in the countryside. Li said that the woman found the virus very scary.

Wang said his mother was getting high-grade N95 masks for when there was a potential initial wave of cases.

The Influence of the Covid-19 Results on Urban Health and Human Health: Implications for Public Health and the Social Stability of China

Many are watching to see how the guidelines are implemented by their local authorities, as there has been some contradiction in how the guidelines are implemented.

In Beijing, there’s a conflict between national guidelines and the health code required for dining in at restaurants or entering some entertainment venues.

There was a world of restrictions that was basically dismantled in a few days. We had been forced to move for so long that all the Covid-19 testing sites were closed on November 30. Businesses outside of high-risk areas would be able to resume operations, after the announcement that they would only be allowed in those areas. Furthermore, a Covid-19 test would no longer be required to enter them.

Some aspects of the new rules are ambiguous and open to interpretation by local governments, including when and where to test people during an outbreak, as well as what defines high-risk areas.

Many people in China live in densely populated high-rise buildings, where it will be difficult to limit transmission. Allowing people to quarantine at home will contribute to viral spread, says George Liu, a public-health researcher at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. This could overwhelm hospitals.

Some studies have estimated China’s abrupt and under-prepared reopening could lead to nearly a million deaths – close to the Covid death toll of the US.

A network of general practitioners doesn’t give China a strong primary medical care system, so people go to the hospital for mild conditions.

Joy Zhang, a sociologist at the University of Kent in England, said that easing the restrictions might not help businesses recover from lengthy lock ups or remove the social stigma associated with COVID-19. I fear that the health and socio-economic risk will be passed on to individuals.

Cowling says urgent guidance is needed to curb transmission in the event of a surge, including mask mandates and work from home policies. And given the reduction in testing, it is not clear how officials will track whether cities are approaching, or have passed, the peak of an infection wave, he says.

Researchers are concerned that hasty changes will not leave enough time to ramp up vaccination among older people. Currently, some 70% of people aged 60 or older, and 40% of those aged 80 or more, have received a third dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

The guidelines propose setting up mobile clinics, and training medical staff to address people’s safety concerns to boost vaccination. But they stop short of issuing vaccine mandates or introducing strong incentives for local governments to increase their vaccination rates, says Huang. Is the rise in infections going to cause a spike in deaths? He says the full impact remains to be unfolded.

Vaccines and vaccines: A case study of a young girl in China, whose production of medicines is heavily contaminated by a dog

I have an advantage over other people because I don’t work at an office. She does not have a job at a company or a government agency that she gets to meet a lot of people. I feel like I protect myself pretty well.

The estimates follow China’s decision at the start of December to abruptly dismantle its strict zero-Covid policy which had been in place for almost three years.

For many, it has its roots in product quality issues that have for years plagued manufacturing in China — including its production of pharmaceuticals. Tan Hua’s case is very similar.

In 2014, Tan, then 34 years old, was bitten by a dog. She was given a shot of the best vaccine on the market when she saw the doctor. But it didn’t go well.

Vaccines are not the answer to COVID-19, says Huang Yanzhong, a Manhattan real estate executive with an office in Beijing

“That very night she got a headache and dizziness. Her memory declined sharply. She had convulsions. She could not see; everything was dark for her. She couldn’t walk straight.

They blame the vaccine, and Hua has been on a crusade for justice ever since. She also now avoids all vaccines — including those for COVID-19, of which China has approved 12.

There have been a few product quality scandals in China in the last few decades, including baby formula cut with industrial chemicals, blood thinners, and vaccines.

According to a survey done in 2020, state media is the most trusted source of information about COVID-19 for most Chinese people. And with access to the global internet cut off for most, there are few alternatives to state media and its constellation of aligned social media accounts, says Huang Yanzhong, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

“Many of those, the vaccine skeptics, are liberal-minded people. He says that they don’t trust the Chinese vaccines and the government narrative on their effectiveness.

Jerry, a real estate executive in Shanghai, is 33 years old — and a good example of that. He did not want his full name used because of the sensitivity of the topic.

Jerry reckons COVID-19 is “kind of a flu thing” these days; nothing too serious. He hasn’t gotten the vaccine and he believes that there’s no point.

“I just think the virus is changing so fast. He emphasizes that vaccines’ ability to prevent transmission doesn’t mean they can save lives.

Jerry estimates that the vaccination rate among his friends — educated, 30-somethings in China’s most cosmopolitan city — may be as low as 60%. He says people trying to become pregnant are afraid of side-effects.

Only about half of people aged 60 and up in Hong Kong were vaccinated when the omicron variant hit in the spring. The rate of deaths per 100,000 people increased to the highest in the world. Some of those who died were over the age of 60.

But Huang, of Seton Hall, says the government may be better off bolstering the incentives for people to get the vaccine, and offering assurances of support in case something goes wrong.

Detection of Covid-like Diseases in the Capital Region: State-Media Interaction after the Mott-Closed Mobility Card Experiment

The mobile itinerary card’s health tracking function was going to be removed on Monday, but new changes were announced.

It had been a point of contention for many Chinese people due to their concern over data collection and the use by local governments to prohibit entry to those who have visited a city with a high-risk zone.

But as the scrapping of parts of the zero-Covid infrastructure come apace, there are questions about how the country’s health system will handle a mass outbreak.

The China Youth Daily published a report on 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299 888-353-1299.

Health workers in the capital were also grappling with a surge in emergency calls, including from many Covid-positive residents with mild or no symptoms, with a hospital official on Saturday appealing to residents in such cases not to call the city’s 911-like emergency services line and tie up resources needed by the seriously ill.

The daily volume of emergency calls had surged from its usual 5,000 to more than 30,000 in recent days, Chen Zhi, chief physician of the Beijing Emergency Center said, according to official media.

A top Covid expert said in an interview Saturday that Covid was spreading rapidly and that it was driven by Omicron variants in China.

It will be difficult to completely stop the transmission chain even with strong prevention and control, said Zhong, who is a public voice since the earliest days of the swine flu epidemic.

It’s not easy to gauge the extent of the spread because official data is no longer reliable due to the rapid roll down of testing nationwide and the shift to using tests at home.

Outside experts warn that China may be underprepared for the expected surge of cases after the decision to lift its measures was met with national protests.

Zhong, in the state media interview, said the government’s top priority now should be booster shots, particularly for the elderly and others most at risk, especially with China’s Lunar New Year coming up next month – a peak travel time where urban residents visit elderly relatives and return to rural hometowns.

The China’s National Health Commission has said that they plan on increasing the number of Intensive Care Units and beds and enhancing medical staff for intensive care.

Meanwhile, experts have warned a lack of experience with the virus – and years of state media coverage focusing on its dangers and impact overseas, before a recent shift in tone – could push those who are not in critical need to seek medical care, further overwhelming systems.

China will drop a travel tracing requirement as part of an “zero-COVID” repeal of the Communist Party’s repressive policies

China’s market watchdog said on Friday that there was a “temporary shortage” of some “hot-selling” drugs and vowed to crackdown on price gouging, while major online retailer JD.com last week said it was taking steps to ensure stable supplies after sales for certain medications surged 18 times that week over the same period in October.

A doctor in Beijing stated in an interview that people who tested positive for Covid-19 but did not have symptoms should not take medicine to recover.

People with symptoms do not need medication at all. It is enough to rest at home, maintain a good mood and physical condition The chief infectious diseasephysician at Beijing You An Hospital said in an interview that has been viewed more than 35 million times on social media.

BEIJING (AP) — China will drop a travel tracing requirement as part of an uncertain exit from its strict “zero-COVID” policies that have elicited widespread dissatisfaction.

The level of public political expression in Beijing and other cities has not been seen in decades as a result of the protests that demanded the resignations of the leader and the Communist Party.

Concerns about a new wave of infections potentially overwhelming health care resources were raised by the relaxation.

At the same time, the government reversed course by allowing those with mild symptoms to recuperate at home rather than being sent to field hospitals that have become notorious for overcrowding and poor hygiene.

Reports on the Chinese internet, which is tightly controlled by the government, sought to reassure a nervous public, stating that restrictions would continue to be dropped and travel, indoor dining and other economic activity would soon be returning to pre-pandemic conditions.

The fires in Urumqi claimed the lives of 10 people. Many believed COVID-19 restrictions may have impeded rescue efforts. Authorities denied the claims spread online, but demonstrators gave voice to longstanding frustration in cities such as Shanghai that have endured severe lockdowns.

The economy fell 2.5% in the three months ending in June and the government promised to decrease the cost and disruption. Forecasters say the economy probably is shrinking in the current quarter. The decline in imports was due to the fact that demand was weak.

Amid the unpredictable messaging from Beijing, experts warn there still is a chance the ruling party might reverse course and reimpose restrictions if a large-scale outbreak ensues.

The announcement last week gave room for local governments to make their own rules. Most restaurants in Beijing, for example, still require a negative test result obtained over the previous 48 hours and rules are even stricter for government offices.

On the knock every resident here dreads: Lars Hamer explains why he moved to Guangzhou, China, in the early 1990s

Editor’s Note: Lars Hamer is the Editor-in-Chief of the China lifestyle magazine, That’s. He moved to Guangzhou, China in the last year. The views expressed in this commentary are his own. He has a verified account on the 140-character social media site@LarsHamer1. CNN has opinions on it.

It’s the knock every resident here dreads. A loud banging at the door of my apartment early Tuesday morning in Guangzhou, China. Health care workers in hazmat suits were ordering everyone to go upstairs because of the neighbor who had tested positive for Covid-19.

There was a reason to worry. Just one month ago, a teacher friend of mine and his colleagues were sent to centralized quarantine after one student at his school tested positive for Covid-19. I was not sure if the same thing would happen to me.

There was nothing of the sort. I took a Covid-19 test and underwhelmingly, that was it. Before my result came out, I was free to go about my day, without being restricted by my house.

I would have been powerless to avoid being labeled a close contact if it happened weeks before, as my friend did.

Change of the Guangzhou metropolis triggered by a Covid-19 lockdown: From a ghost town to a bustling metropolis

Almost overnight, Guangzhou, a city of some 15 million people, has been transformed from a Covid-19 ghost town back to the bustling metropolis I first encountered when I moved here five years ago.

The new measure forbidding the blocking of fire exits during a lockdown is an example. Now, people who are infected can isolate themselves at home. Quarantine facilities are going to be gone very soon.

For months our movements were not tracked because we were gathered in bars and restaurants with QR codes being torn down from the walls.

I spent most days working until late at night because it was the only thing to do; non-essential businesses had closed, and millions of people were confined to their homes. I too started to think about leaving the country when I began to feel the strain.

It was a moment of pure disbelief. Guangzhou had almost 8,000 cases that day, numbers similar to those that triggered a city-wide lockdown in Shanghai in April.

BEIJING (AP) — China’s National Health Commission scaled down its daily COVID-19 report starting Wednesday in response to a sharp decline in PCR testing since the government eased anti-virus measures after daily cases hit record highs.

A notice on the commission’s website said it stopped publishing daily figures on numbers of COVID-19 cases where no symptoms are detected since it was “impossible to accurately grasp the actual number of asymptomatic infected persons,” which have generally accounted for the vast majority of new infections. They’re only reporting confirmed cases from public testing facilities.

Beijing’s streets have grown eerily quiet, with lines forming outside fever clinics — the number of which has been increased from 94 to 303 — and at pharmacies, where cold and flu medications are harder to find.

A group of people wait for the results of their nucleic acid test at a Beijing hospital. Nurses in full-body white protective gear checked in patients one by one.

A few kilometers (miles) south, at Chaoyang Hospital, about a dozen people waited in a line of blue tents, deflecting winds amid subzero temperatures. The person in the queue put a bottle of Disinfectant around her as she waited.

Several people were waiting in line at the pharmacy to get Chinese herbal remedies and cough medication. At the front of the store, a sign said “avoid panic and hoarders, we are doing all we can to give you the medicine you need.” A man coming out had bought two packages of Lianhua Qingwen, a Chinese herbal remedy, saying that each customer was restricted from buying any more than that.

The Implications of Covid-19 Lockdowns for China’s Economic Activity and Real Estate Development in the First Half of the Statistical Year

China’s government-supplied figures have not been independently verified and questions have been raised about whether the Communist Party has sought to minimize numbers of cases and deaths.

Since Tuesday, the U.S. consulates in the northeastern Chinese city of Shenyang and the central city of Wuhan have been offering only emergency services “in response to increased number of COVID-19 cases,” the State Department said.

Hospitals have also been struggling to staff, as well as packages being piled up at distribution points because of a lack of motorized tricycle delivery drivers.

Students at Chinese universities will not have to go abroad in the early part of the year, in hopes of reducing the chance of a bigger COVID-19 outbreak.

The move follows the government’s dramatic announcement last week that it was ending many of the strictest measures, following three years during which it enforced some of the world’s tightest virus restrictions.

Bo Zhuang, a senior analyst at an investment firm based in Boston, said that China is poorly prepared to deal with Covid and will likely experience chaos in the short-term.

On Thursday, a series of indicators pointed to a slowdown in economic activity last month. Retail sales declined 5.9% in November from a year ago, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. In May, the economy was badly hit by widespread Covid lockdowns in the country’s most prestigious city, Shanghai.

Investment in the property sector, which accounts for as much as 30% of China’s GDP, plunged by 9.8% in the first 11 months of the year. The value of property sales went down.

The Covid Epidemics Inflamed by the Onset of Economic Reheating in the Republic of China (Asiaqi)

In November of last year, Covid epidemics spread throughout the country, forcing residents to cut travel and stay at home which had a huge impact on consumption, said Fu Jiaqi in the data release.

Consumption activities that involve personal interaction were greatly affected. Catering sector revenues declined 8.4% last month.

Sales of big-ticket items — such as cars, furniture, and high-end consumer electronics — also contracted sharply, as consumers were wary of spending amid worries about a weak economy. Spending on household appliances and telecoms devices plunged more than 17%. Car sales dropped over 4%.

On Wednesday, the two ruling bodies of the country, the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the State Council, issued a strategic plan to expand domesticdemand and stimulated consumption and investment. It cited rising external risks, including global economic and geopolitical uncertainties.

Three professors at the University of Hong Kong have calculated that a nationwide reopening could be fatal.

The surge of infections would “likely overload many local health systems across the country,” said the research paper, released last week on the Medrxiv preprint server and which has yet to undergo peer review.

Lifting restrictions in each province would lead to demands for up to 2.5 times of surge hospital capacity according to the study.

The first deaths were reported on December 7, but Chinese social media posts show a spike in demand for funeral homes and crematoriums in recent weeks.

Customers would need to wait until the next day to cremate their loved ones if the employee at the Beijing funeral home that was swamped by the long queue is to be believed.

Chinese cities face a surge in infections: predictions from Beijing, Chongqing, Beijing, and New Year’s Eve greetings eariler

The major cities are facing a surge in infections. In the financial hub of Shanghai, schools have moved most classes online starting from Monday. In the southern metropolis of Guangzhou, authorities have told students that are already taking online classes and pre-schoolers not to prepare for a return to school.

In the megacity of Chongqing in the southwest, authorities announced on Sunday that public sector workers testing positive for Covid can go to work “as normal” – a remarkable turnaround for a city that only weeks ago had been in the throes of a mass lockdown.

The worst is yet to come according to Chinese experts. Wu Zunyou, the chief epidemiologist at the Chinese CDC, said the country is being hit by the first of three expected waves of infections this winter.

The current wave was said to last until mid-January, by the speaker at the Beijing conference. There will be a second wave from late January to mid-February next year, triggered by the large amount of travel ahead of the New Year holiday.

Every year, hundreds of millions of people who left their hometowns to build a life in China’s fast growing cities pour into trains, buses and planes to see their family – the largest annual migration on Earth.

Zhong also said that 78% of patients infected with the Omnicron variant won’t be reinfected for quite a long time. Studies show that protection against reinfection goes down steeply over time, and most people will get a re-infection within two years.

The about-face of the Chinese internet: how to deal with the aftermath of a state policy change, or what remedies to fight COVID?

The about-face didn’t go ignored on the Chinese internet. The posts juxtaposing several experts’ TV appearances before and after the state policy change has attracted more than 100,000 views.

There is an apology for Wu Fan, a member of the expert commission who was famous for their insistence that the city could not shut down.

Whiplash aside, much of the online discussion has moved to how to deal with the aftermath of the policy change, including what preventative measures and treatments are available.

Untested remedies to fight COVID have again flourished in recent days. The method of rinsing out your mouth with a cup of iced salt water is recommended by an internal medicine doctor from China’s prestigious Academy of Engineering. Commenters online were baffled. Two years ago, did the salt water rinse not work? Does an iced version make a difference?” A person wrote in a post.

The government in southwest China suggested that tea be made out of monk fruit and orange peel, which are common ingredients in traditional Chinese medicine. Dr. Zhong said weeks ago that he hasn’t found any medication that is effective at preventing a COVID infection.

Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/12/20/1143413739/confusion-and-falsehoods-spread-as-china-reverses-its-zero-covid-policy

Why the Global Times was so Critical of COVID-19, and why the Chinese Diaspora is so Important to Americans – A Conversation with Chen Wenhong

The chaos and uncertainty right now reminds Chen Wenhong, an associate professor of media studies and sociology at University of Texas, of the atmosphere in early 2020 when COVID was first spreading. “It’s kind of flying in the dark,” he said.

Additionally, non-state media outlets are vulnerable to government crackdowns. Ding Xiangyuan was a well-read online health information outlet that debunked health myths and criticized the government’s promotion of traditional Chinese medicine as well as the zero-COVID policy before it was suspended from popular social media platforms in August. Its accounts on the popular Chinese social media site, Weibo, remain silent today.

The Global Times, a newspaper controlled by the Communist Party, quoted a false report in a British tabloid that claimed Moderna manufactured the virus. The Global Times extensively covered the coverage, which used it to attack other unsupported theories about the origin of the virus, including one that claimed it leaked from a government research lab. Some smaller social media accounts made videos of the report, and it ended up in the news.

“The Chinese diaspora has played a very useful role here to share with people back in China about their personal COVID experience,” Chen says, “knowing that in most cases it will not be that serious.”

She states that many people in rural areas rely on television and family members to stay informed when it is time to vote because researchers and journalists don’t pay attention to social media. Many are vulnerable to the disease, live in places where healthcare resources are scarce, and aren’t adept at finding information on social media.

As NPR reported, public health authorities don’t base their messages for the public entirely on science – many considerations are also pragmatic and culturally-based.

Chen says that scientists have some soul searching to do in the next couple of years. How are we going to conduct ourselves if politics is going to have an effect on public health and science? What [are] our ethics?”

Chiral Covid Return to Work in the Zhejiang Province: An Empirical Evidence of Economic Recovery After the Communist Party Reshuffle

The cities of Wuhu, Chongqing and Guiyang, and the province of Zhejiang, collectively home to more than 100 million people, all recently issued directives to public sector employees indicating a shift from preventing infection to allowing the resumption of life and work.

The officials gave similar instructions at Sunday’s news conference, one suggesting a rotation schedule for key teams to make sure they stay on time when an outbreak happens. Guiyang followed suit on Tuesday, according to state media.

The push to return to work comes as China relaxes rules around testing, quarantine and other pandemic policies, in a dramatic step away from its costly zero-Covid policy.

An incessant cycle of outbreaks and lockdowns has coincided with record youth unemployment, disruptions to supply chains and a cratering of the real estate sector that accounts for about 30% of China’s GDP.

“A few months ago if you went out like this, you would be sentenced,” one person commented on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, under the back-to-work announcement.

Bonnie Wang, a fintech worker in Zhejiang’s industrial hub of Ningbo, told CNN that a colleague with Covid symptoms continued to work in the office this week with a fever.

During the pandemic, local governments essentially had a “get-out-of-jail-free card” on their economic performance, said Ryan Manuel, founder of Bilby, a Hong Kong-based company that uses artificial intelligence to analyze Chinese policy.

This shift in priority is clearly reflected in the government’s messaging, with Chinese experts and state media downplaying the severity of Omicron and instead emphasizing the importance of economic recovery.

China’s leaders may be more secure in adjusting their policy after the Communist Party Congress in October, because the economy has been sputtering for several years.

Officials nationwide had worked frantically to contain Covid cases ahead of the highly sensitive twice-a-decade leadership reshuffle, which saw Chinese leader Xi Jinping emerge more powerful than ever into his third term.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/21/business/china-covid-return-to-work-intl-hnk-mic/index.html

China Vidi Return to Work: How Beijing’s subway saw so many commuters a day in the past month, and how it can affect the local economy

But this push for economic growth comes at a cost, one already making itself clear as cases skyrocket across the country, with widespread medicine shortages and reports of crematoriums struggling to keep up.

It’s difficult to gauge the extent of the virus’ spread, given the rapid shift from mandatory testing to self-testing at home. Complicating matters is the fact that many restrictions and rules around returning to work diverge at the local level.

What is the first thing the company sent him? It was his work laptop. She said she empathises with the workers and that it was outrageous, because she understood the need for business to continue.

Beijing’s subway saw 2.21 million passengers on Monday, less than one in five of the total daily commuters, the metro said in an online post. Similar drops were reported in other major cities, including Shanghai and Guangzhou.

“I feel that the local government that introduced this policy is extremely irresponsible,” read a top post on Weibo, where a related hashtag was viewed more than 240 million times on Tuesday. “Asymptomatic and mildly ill patients can still be contagious … and many people have elderly relatives and children at home.”

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/21/business/china-covid-return-to-work-intl-hnk-mic/index.html

Lunar New Year’s Resolution of the Chinese Rural Poverty Problem – Rejoinders or Returns to the Future?

Some took a more cynical tone, criticizing the decision as prioritizing the economy at the expense of workers’ wellbeing, and demanding that their superiors be held to the same expectation.

“I really don’t think the village doctors, or even the township or county hospital, can handle the increased number of severe cases,” says Huan Wang, a researcher at the Stanford Center on China’s Economy and Institutions. The rural villagers are left to fend for themselves in a dark winter.

As the Lunar New Year approaches, health officials are concerned the celebrations could turn into superspreader events, catching rural systems off guard and driving up infections in a country where natural immunity is nearly non-existent and vaccine hesitancy has remained stubbornly high among the older population.

Hundreds of millions of people will return to their hometowns from big cities in a rush to savesay savesay, bringing the disease to vulnerable countryside where vaccine rates are lower and medical resources are not always available.

In its latest briefing, IHME forecasts up to 1 million deaths in 2023 if China does not maintain social distancing policies — a prediction echoed by another model released by researchers at University of Hong Kong last week.

“As the experts say, just set off some fireworks, have a good party and scare away the virus,” says Sun Caiyun, an ebullient restaurant owner in Beijing who says she is intent on heading back to her home village in the northern Shandong province – COVID or not. “Of course I am planning on returning home, because Beijing bans firecrackers!”

The strain of China’s countryside is already evident as medicine shortages hit rural pharmacies. On Chinese social media, rural residents are asking for donations, posting pictures of their destroyed pharmacy shelves without fever and pain medication. Some of the medication has been diverted to cities, which were initially hardest-hit by the surge and where supplies first ran out.

Ray Yip, epidemiologist and founder of the Center for Disease Control’s office in China said the number of deaths is almost bordering on ridiculous.

The hospitals that NPR visited in Beijing were busy but orderly and there were a few elderly patients in the lobby with gurneys and IV bags because beds had run out.

So far, the health care system has held up in large cities – in part because many migrant workers have only rural health insurance that cannot be used in urban hospitals.

“You have to suck it for a few days, that’s all,” saysZhang Xiaohu, a delivery worker who contracted COVID in December. He says he worked through his symptoms, because he does not receive paid sick leave and could not afford to go to a Beijing hospital. “If you want to be a delivery guy, you have to be willing to risk your life.”

While waiting in line, a man said that he and his grandfather had spent days looking for a hospital that could take him because his grandfather tested positive for carbon dioxide.

Cases have gone up since China abandoned zero- Covid. When CNN visited Beijing last week, there were cars waiting in line to enter the crematorium, filled with families who had been waiting more than a day to say goodbye to their loved ones.

The figures were presented during an internal meeting of the National Health Commission in China on Wednesday, according to both outlets which cited sources familiar with the matter. The summary of Wednesday’s meeting stated the treatment of patients that were affected by the new outbreak.

On Friday, a copy of the NHC meeting notes was sent out to the Chinese public, but the document is not verified and the NHC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Financial Times said that the figures were presented by Sun Yang, who was a deputy director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Covid deaths and their consequences at the National Health Care Collaborative Meeting on the Reopening of the China’s Central Hypnotic Disease

The figures are in stark contrast to the public data of the NHC, which reported just 62,592 symptomatic Covid cases in the first twenty days of December.

Wang Guiqang, the top infectious disease doctor in China, told a news conference that deaths caused by respiratory failure and pneumonia after they have contracted the virus are classified as Covid deaths.

The minutes of the NHC meeting on Wednesday didn’t mention discussions about how many people may have died in China according to both reports and the document CNN viewed.

China’s partial reopening has been met with joy and relief by citizens, as well as relief for those who have been separated from their loved ones over the past three years.

The border remains largely closed to foreigners, apart from a limited number of business or family visits — though the government signaled Monday this could loosen, too.

“Finally, everybody can (live) their normal life,” said one Chinese national living in New York, who hasn’t been home for four years. She said the separation was very bad, as many of her family members and her pet dog had died during that time.

Her family “missed (my graduation). She said that they missed so many things. “And I also missed so many things for my family. All my friends got married while the H1N1 was happening. Even some of them had babies. I feel like I missed everything, I missed the most important points in their lives.”

Several Chinese nationals overseas told CNN they had been unable or unwilling to return home for the last few years while the lengthy quarantine was still in place. That stretch meant major life moments missed and spent apart: graduations, weddings, childbirths, deaths.

She said that she was scared because she didn’t know when she could go back. “I definitely feel very happy, I can finally see the end.”

China’s border quarantine travel growth since Trip.com’s Lunar New Year holiday peak jumped to three months after the first official announcement

People in China are also anticipating outbound travel. Most of them have been in the country for several years and are now rushing to book their long-awaited vacations.

Online searches for outbound flights and overseas hotels jumped to a three-year peak on Trip.com, a Chinese travel booking website, according to company data. Within five minutes of the announcement, searches for popular destinations increased dramatically, with many searching for outbound group tours during January’s Lunar New Year holiday season.

Macao, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand, South Korea, the United States and the United Kingdom were among the website’s top 10 destinations with the fastest growth in search volume since the announcement.

“I feel like right now, it’s totally a mess,” said the Chinese national in New York. “Everybody is sick. It’s not the best time to visit my family at the moment. It may be two or three months later.

Some overseas destinations are also on guard. Officials in Italy’s northern Lombardy region have asked Milan’s Malpensa airport — one of the country’s largest international airports — to conduct PCR tests for all arrivals from China from now until the end of January.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/china-border-quarantine-travel-reax-intl-hnk/index.html

The Communist Party of China and the Rise of COVID-19: Towards a New World Economy in Light of China’s Independence from the Communist Era

“It doesn’t matter if I can get back in time for Spring Festival,” said Ma in South Korea, referring to Lunar New Year. “There is hope after all, I can bear waiting for a little while longer.”

China made a decision on Tuesday to stop quarying travelers from other countries as an important step towards reviving business activity and Japan imposed restrictions on visitors from the country due to an outbreak of infections.

The Communist Party’s move to lift the strictest anti- virus controls in the world came as it tries to get its economy going again. Hospitals have been flooded with patients with respiratory issues since the end of curbs that kept millions of people in their homes.

The British Chamber of Commerce hopes China will restart processing business visas to allow for more people to travel between the two countries. It said that will “contribute to restoring optimism and reinstating China as a priority investment destination.”

Japan and India responded to China’s surge in infections by requiring virus tests for travelers from the country. U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to relate internal discussions, said Washington is considering taking similar steps.

The Chinese government has always followed the principle of targeted measures, according to Wang Wenbin. He called for a “science based response and coordinated approach” to keep travelers safe and promote a sound recovery of the world economy.

The ruling party began to join the United States and many other governments who are trying to live with the virus by treating it rather than imposing blanket quarkts on neighborhoods or cities.

The ruling party announced changes Nov. 11 it said were aimed at reducing disruptions after economic activity slid. More changes were announced following protests that erupted Nov. 25 in Shanghai and other cities.

Lu Haoming said the government should have done the job a little better. The death rate of this disease is less serious than it was at the beginning, but the first shock has still been severe.

On Monday, the National Health Commission changed the name of COVID-19 from a class A infectious disease to a class B disease, thus removing it from the list of illnesses that require a hazmat response. It said authorities would stop tracking down close contacts and designating areas as being at high or low risk of infection.

China’s End of the Covid Tunnel: How Beijing’s Exit from the Olympics Becomes a Demonstration of a Democratic Republic

China enters a new decade with great deal of uncertainty and possibly a glimpse of light at the end of the pandemic tunnel after a challenging year.

Beijing showcased the success of its Covid containment measures at the start of the year, by keeping the coronaviruses at bay from the Winter Olympics.

The success added to the party’s narrative that its political system is superior to those of Western democracies in handling the pandemic – a message Xi had repeatedly driven home as he prepared for a third term in power.

Having tied himself so tightly to zero- Covid, he was stuck in a trap. He couldn’t afford to move away from it, the potential surge of infections and deaths posing too great a risk to his authority before he secured his norm-shattering third term at the congress.

And so instead of vaccinating the elderly and bolstering ICU capacity, authorities wasted the next crucial months building larger quarantine facilities, rolling out more frequent mass testing, and imposing wider lockdowns that at one point affected more than 300 million people.

Protests erupted across the country, on a scale unseen in decades. Crowds gathered in major city streets to demand the end of Covid tests and demands for greater political freedom, after a series of protests at university campuses.

The nationwide demonstrations posed an unprecedented challenge to Xi. The economic strain became too severe as the country recorded a daily record of more than 40,000 infections, and governments ran out of money to pay their bills.

While the easing of restrictions is a long-awaited relief for many, the abruptness of it has caught an unprepared public off guard and left them largely to fend for themselves.

Over-the-counter cold and fever medicines – which had been restricted from purchase under zero-Covid – sold out instantly at pharmacies and on online shopping sites. Huge lines have formed outside fever clinics and hospital emergency rooms overflow with patients, many elderly. Crematoriums are struggling to keep up with an influx of bodies.

If the true number of deaths surpasses that of the previous outbreak, it will be hard for the government to justify the years of restrictions that they had justified to save lives.

China will resume issuing passports for tourists to go abroad for next week’s lunar new year despite the COVID-19 pandemic

A flood of millions of Chinese will be going abroad for next week’s lunar new year after China said it will start issuing ordinary visas and passports again.

The lunar new year, which begins on Jan. 22 in Asia and Europe, may see an influx of Chinese tourists to revenue-starved destinations. But it also presents a danger they might spread COVID-19 as infections surge in China.

The National Immigration Administration of China said it will start taking applications Jan. 8 for passports for tourists to go abroad. It said it will resume issuing approval for tourists and businesspeople to visit Hong Kong, a Chinese territory with its own border controls.

There will be applications for ordinary visas and residence permits. It said the government will “gradually resume” allowing in foreign visitors and gave no indication when full-scale tourist travel from abroad might be allowed.

Before the pandemic, China was the biggest source of foreign tourists for most of its Asian neighbors and an important market for Europe and the United States.

On Monday, the government said that travelers from abroad would not be required to be in a vexatious area. Foreign companies appreciated the change to revive slumping business activity.

The China economy is going through a rough period in the early 2020s: A key policy meeting signaling the onset of rapid disease outbreaks

The American Chamber of Commerce in China says more than 70% of companies that responded to a poll this month expect the impact of the latest wave of outbreaks to last no more than three months, ending in early 2023.

Beijing’s recent pivot from its stringent zero-Covid strategy — which had long choked businesses — is expected to inject vitality into the world’s second-largest economy next year.

According to economists, the country’s economy will go through a rough period in the first few months of next year.

A rapid spread of the disease has forced a lot of people indoors and emptied shops and restaurants. More workers are getting sick and so they have forced factories and companies to cut production.

The economy will recover after March according to other experts. In a recent research report, HSBC economists projected a 0.5% contraction in the first quarter, but 5% growth overall for 2023.

The crisis in the industry — which started late in 2021 when several high-profile developers defaulted on their debt — has delayed or halted construction of pre-sold homes across the country. Homebuyers did not pay mortgages on unfinished homes this year.

Despite Beijing’s attempts to rescue the sector, statistics still paint a gloomy picture.

At a key policy meeting earlier this year, the top leaders promised to focus on boosting the economy next year and roll out new measures that would improve the financial condition of the property sector and boost market confidence.

The measures that have been announced so far are not enough to drive a change, but policymakers are signalling that more support is on its way.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/29/economy/china-economy-2023-outlook-hnk-intl/index.html

China is Ready to Work with Russia to Address Hegemonism and Power Politics: After the Christmas 2023 Xi Visited Moscow

The surge of China’s economic growth earlier this year was caused in part by rising prices of the country’s goods and a weaker currency.

China is “ready to work” with Russia to “stand against hegemonism and power politics,” and to oppose unilateralism, protectionism and “bullying,” said Xi. In the spring of 2023, Putin invited China’s president to Moscow.

The sudden lifting of restrictions last month led to an explosion of cases, with little preparation in place to deal with the surging numbers of patients and deaths.

Any uptick in China’s growth will provide a vital boost to economies that rely on Chinese demand. There will be more international travel and production. But rising demand will also drive up prices of energy and raw materials, putting upward pressure on global inflation.

Even though people voiced concern online, travel websites recorded huge spikes in traffic within minutes of the announcement on December 26.

Some countries have offered a warm welcome back, with foreign embassies and tourism departments posting invitations to Chinese travelers on Chinese social media sites. Some countries are more cautious with new testing requirements for travelers from China.

While China is coming out of isolation, everyone wants to know if it will be possible to repair its reputation and relations that crumbled during the Pandemic.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/02/china/china-2023-lookahead-intl-hnk-mic/index.html

What is going to happen with China? China’s response to Putin’s criticism of the Ukranian invasion, Xi’s message of unity, and the prospects for a “new world order”

The lack of top-level face-to-face diplomacy certainly didn’t help, neither did the freeze on in-person exchanges among policy advisers, business groups and the wider public.

The US Secretary of State and other heads of state are expected to visit Beijing this year, as communication lines are reestablishing and more highlevel exchanges are in the works.

Tensions over Taiwan, as well as technological containment, and China’s support for Russia are expected to come up again in the new year, due in part to the virtual meeting between Putin and Xi on December 30.

Both leaders expressed a message of unity, with Xi saying the two countries should “strengthen strategic coordination” and “inject more stability into the world,” according to Chinese state media Xinhua.

Russia’s invasion of Ukranian has been refusedCondemnation by Beijing or even refer to it as such It has decried Western sanctions and blamed NATO and US for the conflict.

China and Russia remain strong strategic partners with several experts telling CNN that their shared vision for a “new world order” is not in doubt.

The China Program Director at the Stimson Center said that the war has been bad for China and bad for Europe. The damage isn’t enough for China to abandon Russia.

This year is going to be tougher on the global economy than the one we have left behind, the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) chief Kristalina Georgieva has warned.

While the US might end up avoiding a recession, the situation in Europe is not good, she said. “Half of the European Union will be in recession,” Georgieva added.

According to a report in Sunday’s editions of the Chinese newspaper, the Chinese leader said he expected his country’s economy to have grown at least 4.4% last year, which was much higher than many had expected but still lower than the 8.0% growth rate seen in 2021.

“When I talk to Asian leaders, all of them start with this question, ‘What is going to happen with China? Is China going to return to a higher level of growth?’ ” she said.

The next couple of months will “be tough for China, and the impact on Chinese growth would be negative,” Georgieva said, adding that she expects the country to move gradually to a “higher level of economic performance, and finish the year better off than it is going to start the year.”

The Rise of the Artificial Intelligence to Warfare Russia and the United States: How Eurasia Accedes to Putin’s War with Ukraine

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Inflation is fourth on the list, behind concerns about a rogue Russia under the leadership of Putin and the consolidation of power in China.

The use of artificial intelligence technology to wreak havoc on the global economy is one of the biggest fears of Eurasia. Eurasia called AI “a gift to autocrats.”

Eurasia, led by political scientist and author Ian Bremmer, pointed out that Russia’s war with Ukraine may become an even bigger problem for the United States and Europe.

“Nuclear saber-rattling by Moscow will intensify. The report said that Putin’s threats will become more explicit. The organization is concerned that Russians will ramp up cyberattacks on Western firms and governments.

That could mean attempts to disrupt oil, American and European satellites and other telecom and tech infrastructure, as well as further efforts to influence and sabotage global elections.

The announcement that Chinese officials were postponing the release of economic data was a sign of things to come for global markets, as was the news that the data would not be released in October.

While inflation is listed as the fourth-biggest risk, Eurasia is still concerned that “rising interest rates and global recession will raise the risk of emerging-market crises.”

The global markets and economy will remain a sticking point as the price of energy remains a problem, as Eurasia notes.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/04/investing/premarket-stocks-trading/index.html

Tik Tok Boom: The Last Stand before the Instability of the FTX Issuing Stocks Trading Platform (FTX)

The phenomenon of the “Tik Tok Boom” is due to the ability and motivation of Gen Z to organize online to rearrange corporate and public policy, making life harder for large companies, and disrupting politics with the click of a button.

Prosecutors allege that SBF was in charge of “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history.” They say that he stole billions of dollars from FTX customers and moved them to cover losses at the hedge fund.

After his arrest last month in the Bahamas, SBF was extradited to the US and then released by a judge on a $250 million bail package. Kara Scannell reports the legal drama for SBF is just beginning. The judge set a trial date of October 2.

The world of criptos was in turmoil before FTX collapsed. The prices of digital coins fell in the year 2022. But FTX and Alameda were each forced to file for bankruptcy in December after investors rushed to pull deposits.

FTX was once valued at $32 billion, based on funding from private investors. The company was expected to be one of the hottest initial public offerings of 2023 as recently as the middle of last year. Not any more.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/04/investing/premarket-stocks-trading/index.html

What will China do next? Consumer Demand in China after the iPhone Pandemic and Covid-Scale Resummation: How China Will Respond to Foreign Investors

The world’s largest iPhone factory in China faced production disruptions since October due to the PAIN epidemic, and this hurt Apple last year.

But the giant campus, owned by top Apple supplier Foxconn, is reportedly now back at 90% production capacity following worker protests and Covid-related restrictions.

In November of 2015, analysts atUBS commented that wait times for new Apple devices in the US were more than a month long due to supply chain issues. That couldn’t have come at a worse time since it was just before Christmas and other winter holidays.

Apple stock didn’t start off Merry in a festive way either, like the rest of Big Tech, even though it had a rough couple of years. Apple shares hit a new low on Tuesday. Apple’s market value dipped below $2 trillion in the process. Just a year ago, Apple was the first company in the world to reach a $3 trillion market valuation.

China has been attempting to convince foreign investors to come back after nearly three years of disrupted supply chains, delays inLogistics, andStrict regulation in sectors from consumer technology to property.

“We will put more focus on expanding domestic demand, keeping supply chains stable, supporting the private sector, and reform state-owned enterprises to attract foreign investment and prevent economic and financial risks,” reassured the country’s vice premier.

She says China-watchers are still waiting to see more substantial pro-business policy changes, such as giving private and foreign firms equal access in technology and certain industrial sectors and reducing tariffs on imported goods.

“It is not enough to talk about these things,” she says. “The message and the practice of it has to really align to strongly encourage foreign investors.”

The official 3% GDP growth figure for 2022, despite multiple disruptions and lockups, is points to by Salidjanova. The market was not convinced by the numbers. That’s not very encouraging. The first step is to actually start releasing accurate numbers so investors can trust you again.”

Marro thinks that there will be some consumer demand after China gets over the surge in COVID cases. Chinese consumers have a bit more to spend after putting their reduced income into savings during the Pandemic.

They’re sensitive to the notion that China could reverse course and reopen its economy, Marro says. “We are expecting this consumer recovery to be really drawn out.”

Predictions for COVID Vaccines and the Spread of the Disease and its Effects on Epidemic Spread and Immunity

“Part of the equation for how long that immunity [to the current COVID strain] lasts is how quickly the virus is evolving,” says Lauren Ancel Meyers, a professor at the Center for Pandemic Decision Science at the University of Texas.

What is the variant that is going to be the next variant that will spread over the world? What similarity does it have to the current spread variant and the vaccines they use to keep people safe?