After Xinjiang, China, the Covid outbreak broke: A yelling abuse victim in the airport, and the Communist Party congress

In China’s far west region of Xinjiang, there was a neartotal lock down and an admission of failure in the way the Covid outbreak was handled. The authorities vowed to cut the spread of the computer viruses in the north. The government canceled flights in a popular travel destination in southern China, trapping tourists at an airport.

The video she made yelling abuse at the hazmat-clad workers below has gone viral on social media platforms, and it appears to show the growing frustration of the Chinese public with their government’s uncompromising zero-concentration policy.

A woman has been under quark for a year after returning from university, she yelled at the workers. They looked back, unmoved.

While most Asian economies are abandoning restrictions on tourism, China still insist that the fight against the disease remainswinnable, even though most economies have already abandoned restrictions.

Even as a new strain of infections is spreading just days before the most important political event of the century– the Communist Party Congress in Beijing– it is still being claimed that he is the greatest leader in decades.

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.

The Global Chinese Civil Unrest Protest “No to Covid Test, No to Food, Nonequilibrium Freedom, and No to Demonstration”

There are fears in Beijing where online photos posted Thursday appeared to show a rare public protest. “Say no to Covid test, yes to food. Freedom not to be locked up. No to lies, yes to dignity. No to cultural revolution, yes to reform. No to great leader, yes to vote. Despite the heightened security surrounding the Congress, there is a banner hung on an overpass that says don’t be a slave, be a citizen.

The central information hub for the protest has been the collection of social media accounts called thememe pages. Six months ago, they posted a mix of historical photos, pandemic memes, and China news. They crowdsource and make visible protest footage, political posters and first-hand narratives from around the world, and some of them also mobilize followers and publish mini think-pieces. All these are connected to the ongoing Chinese civil unrest, the largest wave since the 1989 pro-democracy movement. The global protests were unexpected by even the most optimistic China pundits.

Numerous accounts on Weibo and WeChat, the super-app essential for daily life in China, have been banned after commenting on – or alluding to – the protest.

Many people spoke out to express their admiration and support. Some shared the Chinese pop hit “Lonely Warrior” which was a veiled reference to protester, while others wrote “I saw it” and posted under the #.

In the face of rising discontent, all the signs point to the party sticking with the zero- Covid approach and the state media articles this week did not deter speculation that the country may change tack after Congress.

Beijing Will Not Let It Down: Implications for the Second China COVID-19 Lockdown and for the Diagnosis of Inner Mongolia

In Shanghai, where 25 million people have already endured two months of the world’s strictest lockdown, residents are now on edge at any signs of a repeat as authorities begin to tighten measures once again.

China announced 8,500 new cases on Monday, bringing the nation’s total to over 300,000 cases and 5,235 deaths. In the United States, there are more than one million COVID-19 deaths.

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.

That panic buying has been made worse by an announcement that Shanghai’s water authorities have taken action to ensure water quality after discovering saltwater inflows to two reservoirs at the mouth of the Yangtze River in September.

The Chinese government has relied on the public health experts in China to relay information about the virus since late last year as a giant wave of infections looms, but their credibility is in danger because of the shift in messaging.

The country has also seen an uptick in cases in domestic tourist destinations, despite its strict curbs having discouraged people from traveling or spending over China’s Golden Week holiday in early October.

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. One university communist party boss was fired after 39 students tested positive for the disease at his institution.

There are some 22 million people who have been banned from leaving the region and are forced to stay in western Xinjiang. According to an official tally, there were over three hundred new cases on Thursday.

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 was winnable, it said. Other countries that had reopened and eased restrictions had done so because they had no choice, it said, as they had failed to “effectively control the epidemic in a timely manner.”

After the first coronavirus outbreak in early 2020, anger boiled over in the city, and the Communist Party sent top officials to deal with it. One of them, Sun Chunlan, stayed for three months, rallying local cadres and sourcing protective gear for health workers and hospital beds for patients.

Calling for absolute loyalty in a war against the virus, Ms. Sun warned that any deserters would be “nailed to the pillar of historical shame forever.”

What’s wrong with a woman in the upper echelons of Chinese politics if your health code turns yellow on Wednesday evening?

As the rare woman in the upper echelons of Chinese politics, it is a role to which she has become accustomed, driving the Communist Party’s will and bearing the country’s criticism. “Women most of the time get pushed to the frontline when male politicians don’t want to deal with a crisis,” said Hanzhang Liu, assistant professor of politics at Pitzer College.

When he is anointed as the party leader on Sunday, Xi will become the most powerful leader in decades.

As China’s Communist Party National Congress meets this week to approve the party’s priorities for the next five years, many are watching for signs restrictions could be loosened. Changes to the policy would need to be made from the top of the party, with a leader who wanted to maintain the party’s control on daily life.

China’s advanced online ecosystem – run on mobile phone superapps and ubiquitous QR codes – has offered arguably unrivaled convenience for consumers to shop, dine and travel. Now, those technologies play a role in constraining daily life.

When her health code turned yellow on Wednesday evening, she would usually be prevented from entering most public places until another test came back with a positive result. With the new rules she knew she could leave freely but instead she kept her house and wait and see.

Across the country, if you don’t have a negative Covid test and aren’t close to a patient, you’re going to be flagged as a close contact and this can make it difficult to enter an office building or grocery store.

If you are placed in a mall or office building as part of a snaplock, you can be exposed to a risk if someone in the general area tests positive, that is if you go out in the public.

“(You see) all the flaws of big data when it has control over your daily life,” said one Shanghai resident surnamed Li, who spent a recent afternoon scrambling to prove he didn’t need to quarantine after a tracking system pinned his wife to a location near to where a positive case had been detected.

He said that they reached a hotline and explained their situation, ultimately returning her health code to green.

The costs of the Communist Party zero-covid campaign vs. the end of the Cold War, and the coming era of global vaccines

There was an editorial in the People’s Daily published last week stating that the focus of the party was putting people first and priorities life, and that these lines were similar to ones released by the party last week.

“What makes you think that you won’t be on that late-night bus one day?” read a viral comment, which garnered more than 250,000 likes before it was censored – one of a number of glimpses into rising frustration with the cost of the policy.

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.

Speaking to a group of 2,300 Communist Party members at the opening of a leadership shuffle on Sunday, Xi made a point of saying that the party had protected the people’s health and safety to the greatest extent.

The impact of those controls is becoming even more noticeable, as they leave people struggling for access to 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.

The cost of maintaining the zero- Covid strategy is more expensive now than it was a year ago because of the increasing prevalence of viral infections, says Ben Cowling of the University of Hong Kong.

The consequences of leaving the policy will be significant. Experts say China has staked its policy around preventing Covid-19 deaths from occurring in the country, if the virus were to spread within the country.

That leaves many unprepared for an impending surge of cases in a country where most people have not had contact with the virus.

The Chinese government has supported a large vaccine campaign since mid-March, but it has relied on local shots that produce fewer protective antibodies than those developed in the West.

“The vaccines take time, the ICU expansion takes time – and if you don’t see effort to prepare for the change, that implies that they are not planning to change the policy any time soon,” said Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

The Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and Other Social Disruptions in China: A Call for Action against COVID-19

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

There was the Great Leap Forward, the industrial reform campaign begun in 1958 that precipitated a devastating famine; the political witch hunts of the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, which nearly tore China apart; and many more, some more damaging than others, and each targeting some political, social or economic imperative of the day. One of the best achievements of the Communist Party was their close relationship with the population.

Editor’s Note: Matthew Bossons is an editor and journalist based in Shanghai. He has lived in China since 2014. The views are of his own. There is more opinion on CNN.

The Chinese government issued new guidelines easing some of its strict zero-COVID policies on Wednesday. Some people with mild to no symptoms of the disease will be allowed to stay at home, instead of being in a centrally managed facility. But researchers worry the changes will lead to a rise in infections that risk overwhelming hospitals.

Students in many cities in China are back to remote learning. My 5 year old daughter is on her second week off school because her kindergarten closed because of restrictions related to Covid-19 She has spent more time at home than in the classroom.

A three day walk around the city to avoid being self-isolated by public health authorities in the wake of a lockdown at a manufacturing center

It was almost impossible to plan more than 20 minutes ahead of time because of the moment’s notice restrictions. This is bad for business and affects the ability of ordinary people to go about their daily lives, you never know when you will get locked down in your apartment, workplace or any other place.

People who have had to suffer through an emergency have taken to carrying a backpack full of clothes, toiletries, and work essentials with them, in case they get trapped at the local pub.

One in five urban youth in the country are jobless, business meetings and trade shows are being postponed or canceled, and workplaces are regularly shuttered over concerns about the coronavirus, including the recent lockdown at a Foxconn manufacturing center — which left employees literally fleeing down a highway.

I walked around Shanghai — riding public transit, sitting maskless in an office, cramming in packed elevators — for three days before public health authorities contacted me and told me I needed to quarantine.

If you are traveling from a city afflicted with a disease, you should be given an immediate notice that you are going to be self-isolated. Alas, not.

My wife and daughter, who live with me in the apartment, were able to leave and wander around the city at will while I stayed home for four days. Now, let’s assume I was infected with the virus and that my family were now carriers: Why would a policy intended to protect people’s health “to the greatest extent possible,” to quote Xi, allow for such a flagrant risk to public wellness?

On the heels of the Inner Mongolia suicide, Chinese social media users lamented the role lockdowns have played in fueling mental health issues and criticized government officials for not paying attention to the needs of those trapped in their apartments.

A woman with an anxiety disorder leaped to her death from her apartment in the capital city of China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region earlier this month.

There was a suspected gas leak in a locked-down residential compound that led to the death of a 3-year-old boy. On social media, the boy’s father alleged that he tried to alert local health workers to call an ambulance but was denied prompt access to emergency services due to his Covid-19 testing status.

The fans are seen without masks or being told to submit proof of Covid 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.

Following the young boy’s death in Lanzhou, the internet rage machine was running at full capacity, with related hashtags on Weibo racking up hundreds of millions of views.

Protests erupted Nov. 25 after 10 people died in a fire in the northwestern city of Urumqi. Many believed that COVID-19 restrictions may have slowed down rescue efforts. The claims were denied, but demonstrators gave voice to longstanding frustration in cities that have suffered through severe lock downs.

Unfortunately for those hoping for a swift end to zero-Covid, negative public feedback is unlikely to result in any immediate changes. If the economic situation doesn’t change, the government may have to rethink its position, which happened before.

Covid Discontent Reopening Mic Intl HiKK: The Case of an Auto Dealer whose Father was killed by the Local Government

Editor’s Note: A version of this story appeared in CNN’s Meanwhile in China newsletter, a three-times-a-week update exploring what you need to know about the country’s rise and how it impacts the world. Do you want to sign up here?

Zhou, an auto dealer in northeastern China, last saw his father alive in a video chat on the afternoon of November 1, hours after their home on the far outskirts of Beijing was locked down.

At the time, they were unaware that Covid restrictions had been imposed, and the apartment building where Zhou and his family 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.

Zhou said he contacted several state media outlets in Beijing to report on his story, but no reporters came. Amid growing desperation and anger, he turned to foreign media – despite knowing the risk of repercussions from the government. CNN is only using his surname to mitigate that risk.

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.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/25/china/china-zero-covid-discontent-reopening-mic-intl-hnk/index.html

Chinese authorities in protest against Covid lockdowns: A human hero’s voice in the city’s largest and hottest social hubs

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 not live. He shouted to the crowd that he was a hero and they wrestled him away from the police officers who tried to take him away.

The defiance shown by these acts reflected an outrage from Chinese football fans, who have only been able to watch from home as tens of thousands of fans pack stadiums for the World Cup.

There are signs that Chinese officials are feeling the heat of the growing public discontent, which came on top of the heavy social and economic tolls inflicted by the widening lockdowns.

Local officials are reverting to the zero-tolerance tactics they used in the past when it came to infections.

The city of Shijiazhuang is located in the north. It also allowed students to go back to school. But as cases rose over the weekend, authorities reimposed a lockdown on Monday, telling residents to stay home.

On Tuesday, financial hub Shanghai banned anyone arriving in the city from entering venues including shopping malls, restaurants, supermarkets and gyms 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.

Despite relaxed rules, restaurants were mostly closed or empty in the capital. Many businesses are having difficulty finding enough staff who haven’t gotten infected. Sanlitun, one of Beijing’s most popular shopping districts, was deserted despite having its anti-COVID-19 fences taken down in recent days.

The Chinese government has denied that the 20 measures listed in the guidelines are for a pivot to living with the virus.

The measures are about “optimizing” existing Covid prevention and control policy, Shen Hongbing, a disease control official, told a news conference last week. He said they are not an easing of control, let alone reopening or lying flat.

Zhou said that the zero-covid policy is beneficial to the majority, and that the implementation at a local level had been too harsh.

He doesn’t want things like this to happen again in China or anywhere in the world. “I lost my father. My son lost his beloved grandfather. I’m furious now.”

The Impact of the Covid Zero Relaxation Reaction in China on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Can Chinese Workers Feel Like They Are Finally Back to Normal?

After the government unveiled an new policy to tackle the spread of infections, workers across China have torn down the signs of zero- Covid controls and removed the health code from metro station walls.

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 fast?” “Ding, what are you saying?” It makes me feel like we are fools. It’s all up to them. They said it’s good, so then it’s good … that’s what I feel right now. I have no choice but to watch it. 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.

Even though I was very happy about these new changes, most of my friends are showing typical signs of post traumatic stress disorder, they just can not believe it is happening.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/08/china/china-zero-covid-relaxation-reaction-intl-hnk/index.html

Protests against the Covid Epidemic Variable Omicron Anomaly: Beijing and the Central Government’s Response to the Decline

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.

But the changes, which come on the heels of a wave of unprecendented protests across the country against harsh Covid restrictions, are a swift about-face for a government long bent on stamping out all infections. While health authorities made slight policy revisions and cautioned officials against overreach last month, the central government up until last week had shown no signs of preparing for an imminent shift in its national strategy.

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.

State media have already begun trying to change everyone’s thinking by downplaying the lethality of the Omicron variant. The elderly are going to receive a huge drive to be injected with a vaccine.

There were many reports of panic buying of fever medication on the Weibo social media platform in China as topics related to what to do if Omicron was to be found were very high on Thursday morning.

“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 should have been done a long, long time ago according to Sam Wang, 26, a lawyer in Beijing.

Others were concerned about how they were living with the virus. Aurora Hao, 27, an English teacher in Beijing said: “I want to keep myself safe, because I could be fine after my first infection, but if I am reinfected a second or third time, I’m not sure what harm that will bring to my body.”

Wang said his mother was preparing for a nuclear winter when the initial wave of cases would have passed.

The reopening of Covid-19 tests in Beijing: Implications for local health and social policy, and for the NHS and the public health sector

Already there has been some contradiction in how the guidelines are implemented as local authorities adjust – and many are watching to see the impact in their cities.

In Beijing, authorities on Wednesday said a health code showing a negative Covid-19 test would still be required for dining in at restaurants or entering some entertainment venues – in conflict with the national guidelines.

Then, in the space of just a few days, this world of restrictions was quite literally dismantled. On November 30, all the Covid-19 testing sites were closed. It was announced that businesses that were outside of high-risk areas would be allowed to reopen. The Covid-19 test is no longer required to enter them.

Some aspects of the new rule are open to interpretation by the local governments, including when and where to test people during an outbreak, and what makes up high-risk areas.

Furthermore, the guidelines do not lift testing and quarantine requirements for international travellers, which “doesn’t have a rationale if the objective is no longer zero COVID”, says Ben Cowling, an epidemiologist at the University of Hong Kong.

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.

The timing of the reopening is not ideal according to researchers. Hospitals will already be seeing an increase in patients due to the winter’s flu season. The increase in the number of people travelling for the next month’s lunar new year and spring festival is an economist’s opinion.

On Sunday, the number of patients visiting fever clinics was 16 times greater than the week before. In China, where there isn’t a strong primary care system, visiting the hospital is common for minor illness.

Without additional support, the eased restrictions might not help businesses to recover from protracted lockdowns or remove the social stigma attached to COVID-19, says Joy Zhang, a sociologist at the University of Kent in Canterbury, UK. I fear the health and socio- economic risk will be passed on to individuals.

Urgent guidance is needed on how to curb transmission during a surge, such as through mask mandates, work-from-home policies and temporary school closures, says Cowling. 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.

There is a fear that hasty changes will not leave enough time to protect older people from vaccine-related diseases. 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 study states that the death toll could be reduced by 26% to 40% with vaccine coverage of 85% and 40%.

Tan Hua’s “best rabies vaccine” was not recommended by her mother, but by a woman she’d never met

“I have an advantage in that I don’t go to an office to work. She doesn’t work at a company or a government agency, and she doesn’t get to meet a lot of people. I think I protect myself well.

China’s leaders had long praised “zero-COVID” for keeping numbers of cases and deaths much lower than in other nations, but health officials are now saying the most prevalent omicron variety poses much less of a risk.

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

Tan was bit by a dog in 2014, he was 34. She saw a doctor and was given a shot of what her mother, Hua Xiuzhen, says they were told was the best rabies vaccine on the market. It didn’t work out.

Evading the Vaccine Scenarios in China: A Case Study with a High-Density Shanghai Real Estate Executive

She got a head ache and dizziness that night. Her memory declined sharply. She had convulsions. She couldn’t see, everything was dark for her. She couldn’t walk straight,” Hua told NPR by phone.

They blame the vaccine, and Hua has been on a crusade for justice ever since. She now avoids vaccines, including the ones for COVID-19, that China has approved.

A string of product quality scandals has arisen in China from poor oversight and corruption during recent decades of rapid economic growth.

Survey results show that state media and health professionals are the most trustworthy sources of information for most people in China. With access to the global internet cut off for most, there are only a few alternative ways to get information, according to a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“Many of those, the vaccine skeptics, are liberal-minded people. They don’t trust the Chinese government’s narrative on the effectiveness of the Chinese vaccine, he says.

Jerry, a real estate executive in Shanghai, is 33 years old — and a good example of that. The topic is sensitive, so he did not want his full name used.

Jerry reckons COVID-19 is “kind of a flu thing” these days; nothing too serious. He doesn’t think there is any point in getting the vaccine because he hasn’t gotten it.

“I just think the virus is changing so fast. So not a single vaccine can help,” he says, focusing on vaccines’ ability to prevent transmission rather than stave off serious illness and death.

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 states that couples are particularly worried about possible side-effects of getting pregnant.

The current strains of Omicron will spread faster in China than in other parts of the globe because they have immunity against previous strains, according to University of Hong Kong chair professor of epidemiology Ben Cowling.

China’s zero-Covid epidemic: Why it won’t happen, and how it will be dealt with it in the coming few months

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.

On Monday, authorities announced that the mobile itinerary card health tracking function wouldn’t be functioning the following day.

It has been a point of contention for many Chinese people, because it is used by local governments to ban entry to people who have visited a city with a high-risk zone, even if they don’t go there.

There are concerns about how the country’s health system will handle a mass outbreak as it gets rid of parts of the zero- Covid infrastructure.

The China Youth Daily reported hours-long lines at a clinic in central Beijing, and said experts urged people not to visit hospitals unless they were absolutely necessary.

Health workers in the capital were grappling with a surge of emergency calls and an official appealed for residents with mild or no symptoms to not call the emergency services line.

According to the official media, the volume of emergency calls in recent days had increased from its usual 5000 to more than 30,000.

In an interview published by state media, a top Covid-19 expert said the disease was spreading rapidly in China.

Even if prevention and control is good, it will be difficult to completely cut off the transmission chain, according to Zhong, a public voice since the early days of the epidemic in 2020.

The rapid rollback of testing nationwide and the shift by many people to use antigen tests at home has also made it difficult to gauge the extent of the spread, with official data now appearing meaningless.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/china/china-zero-covid-impact-beijing-intl-hnk-mic/index.html

CHIROMEDICAL PROBLEMS AFTER COVID-19 PASSENGER SURVEYS PEOPLE IN Beijing (AP)

Outside experts have warned that China may be underprepared to handle the expected surge of cases, after the surprise move to lift its measures in the wake of nationwide protests against the policy, growing case numbers and rising economic costs.

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.

Faced with a surge in COVID-19 cases, China is trying to strengthen the hospitals’ ability to deal with severe cases.

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.

On Friday China’s market watchdog said there is a temporary shortage of hot-selling drugs, and promised to crack down on price-tagbing, as major online retailers said they were taking precautions to ensure stable supplies.

A Beijing doctor said in a state media interview that people who tested positive for Covid-19 but did not show signs of ill-effects would not need to take medication to recover.

People withsymptomatic issues do not need medication at all. It’s enough to rest at home and have good physical and mental health. The doctor who works at Beijing You An Hospital said in an interview that his hospital had seen over 400 million views on the topic in the last five days.

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.

Last month in Beijing and several other cities, protests over the restrictions grew into calls for leader Xi Jinping and the ruling Communist Party step down, in a level of public political expression not seen in decades.

China’s $Lambda0$ crisis after a three-year low-lying population, with implications for diseases and healthcare systems

Concerns about a new wave of infections potentially overwhelming health care resources in some areas have been sparked by the relaxation.

The government decided to allow mild symptoms to be treated at home rather than being sent to field hospitals that have become notorious for overcrowding and poor hygiene.

There were reports on the Chinese internet that reassured the public that restrictions would be dropped and that economic activity would soon return to pre-pandemic levels.

The economy, which has been on a downward spiral since the previous quarter, shrunk 2.6% from the previous quarter in the three months ending in June. Forecasters say the economy probably is shrinking in the current quarter. The plunge in imports was a sign of weak demand.

There is a chance that the ruling party will reverse course and impose restrictions if there is a large-scale outbreak.

There was sufficient room for local governments to give their own regulations last week’s announcement. 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.

The knock every resident here dreads: Lars Hamer and the change of city life in Guangzhou after a study of Covid-19

Editor’s Note: Lars Hamer is the Editor-in-Chief of the China lifestyle magazine, That’s. He has lived in Guangzhou, China since 2018. The views he expresses in this commentary are his own. His bio says you can follow him on social media. Read more opinion on CNN.

It’s the knock every resident here dreads. Early Tuesday morning, a sudden loud banging at the door of my apartment in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou. Instantly, fear washed over me; health care workers in hazmat suits were ordering everyone to go downstairs because a neighbor had tested positive for Covid-19.

I had good 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 feared the same was about to happen to me.

I was surprised to find nothing of the sort. I took the Covid-19 test, but it wasn’t very good. Before my result even came out, I was free to leave my house and go about my day, totally unrestricted.

If this had occurred just weeks before, I would have, like my friend, been labeled a “close contact” and therefore would have been powerless to avoid the quarantine facility’s vice-like grip.

Guangzhou was almost back to normal over the next few days. There were many people in the streets. Friends and families who had not seen each other for months gathered in bars and restaurants, and QR codes were being ripped down from walls; our movements no longer tracked.

Just look at the new measure forbidding the blocking of fire exits in the event of a lockdown, for example. Now, people who are infected can isolate themselves at home. Quarantine facilities are soon to be a thing of the past.

Our movements were no longer tracked, as friends and families who had not seen each other in months were gathering in bars and restaurants.

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 began to feel the strain and started considering leaving the country.

It was a moment of disbelief. The number of cases in Guangzhou were similar to the ones that locked down the city in April.

The National Health Commission scaled down the daily report after a decline in the number of cases due to the fact that the government is easing the anti-viruses measures.

Since it was not feasible to accurately grasp the actual number of asymptomatic individuals, the commission has stopped publishing daily figures on new infections. The only numbers they’re reporting are confirmed cases detected in 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.

At the China-Japan Friendship Hospital’s fever clinic in Beijing, a dozen people waited for nucleic acid test results. Nurses in protective gear check 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. A person in the queue sprayed a bottle of antiseptic around her as she waited.

Across the street at Gaoji Baikang Pharmacy, around a dozen people waited in line for cough medication and Chinese herbal remedies. The sign at the front of the store said, “We are doing all we can to fulfill your needs.” 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.

Statistical Aspects of COVID-19 Infections in the Beijing Public Health Department and the City of Shenyang and Wuhan

Questions have been raised about whether the Communist Party has sought to minimize the number of deaths or cases in China despite the fact that the government-supplied figures have not been independently verified.

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 reportedly been struggling to remain staffed, while packages were piling up at distribution points because of a shortage of China’s ubiquitous motorized tricycle delivery drivers.

Some Chinese universities say they will allow students to finish the semester from home in hopes of reducing the potential for a bigger COVID-19 outbreak during the January Lunar New Year travel rush.

The government’s sudden announcement that it was ending many of the strictest measures follows three years during which it enforced some of the world’s tightest virus restrictions.

The Sanlitun shopping district was affected by the outbreak in the city. There, the usually bustling shops and restaurants were without customers and, in some cases, functioning on skeleton crews or offering takeout only.

One community worker told CNN that 21 of the 24 workers on her Beijing neighborhood committee office, tasked with coordinating residential matters and activities, had fallen ill in recent days.

Sylvia Sun said there hasn’t been much work given to them due to the fact that most of our superiors are infections. “(The usual) events, lectures, performances, parent-child activities will definitely not be held.”

The NHC said in a notice that it is not possible to accurately grasp the number of infections.

JamesZimmerman, a Beijing-based lawyer and former American Chamber of Commerce in China chairman, said about ninety percent of his office were Covid.

The city’s major hospitals recorded 19,000 patients with flu symptoms from December 5 to 11 – more than six times that of the previous week, a health official said Monday.

Most of the 50 cases in hospitals have underlying health conditions so far, according to Sun Chunlan, China’s top official in charge of managing Covid.

Most of the new infections in Beijing are mild cases and there’s an urgent need for more fever clinics, as well as assurances about the supply of medicines, said Sun.

Prominent Shanghai physician Zhang Wenhong warned that hospitals should do everything they could to ensure that health workers were not getting infected as quickly as the people in the communities they serve. Such a situation could result in a shortage of medical staff and infections among patients, he said, according to local media reports.

Social media users questioned why the reporter, who showed her two-bed room and access to fever medicine in a video interview posted by her employer Beijing Radio and Television Station on Sunday, received such treatment while others were struggling.

“Awesome! A young reporter gets a space in a temporary hospital and takes liquid Ibuprofen for children that is hard-to-find for parents in Beijing,” read one sarcastic comment, which got thousands of likes.

Tea From China: Social Media vs. the Communist Party: Why Chinese Societal Media Has It Ended, and Why Chinese Hospitals Need More Hospitals

The government of southwest China wanted to make tea out of orange peel and monk fruit to prevent infections. After weeks of searching, Dr. Zhong said he had not found any medication that would prevent the transmission of a colonic disease.

The majority of the people I attended the protest with were from the Chinese diaspora. China’s youth have long been viewed as apathetic by the Chinese Communist Party, and due to a culture of intense surveillance and censorship, are no longer connected to the country’s radical past. Most millennials and Gen Z had zero organizing or protesting experience, but now they are connecting over social media into a nascent movement against a powerful authoritarian regime.

Instagram has enjoyed more popularity than Twitter among Chinese with access to the global internet (sometimes via VPN) due to its initially apolitical, entertainment-heavy content. As the number of Chinese users grew, meme boards featuring the lives of study-abroad Chinese students emerged. The personal meme accounts of the founders were radicalized along with their followers. There are two different types of pages: meme pages and nostalgic mood boards.

Under the current conditions, a nationwide reopening could result in up to 684 deaths per million people, according to the projections by three professors at the University of Hong Kong.

A research paper that has not yet been reviewed said a surge of infections would overload many local health systems across the country.

Lifting restrictions in all provinces would lead to a higher demand for hospital beds and more surge hospital capacity.

They were the first officially reported deaths since the dramatic easing of restrictions on December 7, although Chinese social media posts have pointed to a surge in demand at Beijing’s funeral homes and crematoriums in recent weeks.

An employee at a funeral home on the outskirts of Beijing told CNN they were swamped by the long queues for cremation, and customers would need to wait until at least the next day to cremate their loved ones.

China’s growing epidemic of cyber-attacks: The first wave of infection is expected to run until January 21, triggering the Lunar New Year holiday

Other major cities are experiencing a rise in infections. In the financial hub of Shanghai, schools have moved most classes online starting from Monday. Pre-schoolers and students taking online classes in Guangzhou have been warned not to get ready for school.

A city that only weeks ago was in the middle of a mass lockdown due to Covid can now say that all workers tested positive can return to work.

Experts in China are saying that the worst is yet to come. 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 will run until mid-January, according to the speaker at the Beijing conference. The second wave is expected to last from late January to mid-February next year, triggered by the mass travel ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, which falls on January 21.

Each year, hundreds of million of people who have left their hometowns in order to live in China’s rapidly developing cities rush into trains, buses and planes to see their families.

Zhong said that most patients will be out of danger for a long time. Studies suggest protection against reinfection declines dramatically over time and most people will be reinfected every one to two years.

On the controversy surrounding China’s COVID policy change after the election: comment on Wufan, a member of Shanghai’s Containment Expert Commission, and how to deal with it

The about-face did not go unnoticed on the Chinese internet. Posts juxtaposing several experts’ TV appearances before and after state policy change – including Zhong and Liang – have garnered more than 100,000 views.

Wu Fan, a member of Shanghai’s disease outbreak containment expert commission famous for insisting that Shanghai could not shut down is now receiving apologies online.

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. A doctor who is a member of the Academy of Engineering in China advised using iced salt water daily to rinse out your mouth. Commenters were confused. Was salt water rinse discredited two years ago? Is it possible that an iced version makes a difference? one wrote in a blog post.

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

Social Media Controversies in the 2020’s: How the Chinese Diaspora Helped to Inform the Public about COVID

An associate professor of media studies and sociology at the University of Texas, Chen Laden, noticed the atmosphere in the early 2020’s when COVID was first spreading. It’s kind of out of place in the dark.

Additionally, non-state media outlets are vulnerable to government crackdowns. The government’s promotion of Chinese medicine as well as the zero-COVID policy was criticized before it was suspended from popular social media platforms. Its accounts on the popular Chinese social media site, Weibo, remain silent today.

A recent example was how the Communist Party-controlled newspaper, The Global Times, cited a misleading report in the British tabloid, Daily Mail, that suggested without evidence that vaccine maker Moderna manufactured the virus. The Global Times extensively cited the coverage, using it to attack other unsupported theories about the virus’s origin, including the one that suggested it leaked from a government research lab in Wuhan. Other smaller social media accounts made videos of the report, putting “British Media” in the headlines.

“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 points out that even though research and journalists often pay attention to social media, many rural residents rely on TV and family members to stay informed. 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. “If we know that politics is going to play a role in public health and also in science, how do we conduct ourselves? What do we think about our ethics?