What really happens in China with the zero-Covid strategy. Report Ft
While experts warn China of the economic damage caused by long and repeated lockdowns, Xi Jinping's government is stepping up its propaganda efforts in support of the new strategy called "dynamic zero-Covid". The Financial Times article
On Thursday, the official Chinese news agency Xinhua published an article warning that the country's medical system was in danger of "collapsing" in the event of a mass Covid epidemic, according to the Financial Times , echoing Wednesday's comments from President Xi Jinping who urged citizens to "overcome the complacency phase" in "response to the mutation of the virus".
"The global pandemic is still severe so we cannot relax controls now," Xi said during a visit to the southern province of Hainan.
Beijing's decision to tighten its blockade measures to combat the spread of the highly contagious but milder variant Omicron stands in stark contrast to most of the rest of the world, which is learning to live with the virus.
Bo Zhuang, a Singapore analyst of Loomis Sayles, said local governments were "grossly underestimating" the economic damage caused by the lockdowns, which disrupted supply chains and froze vital long distance links that allow the flow of goods throughout. the country.
"The Chinese economy is based on supply chains," Zhuang said, pointing to how several electric vehicle manufacturers, including Tesla, have suspended production because they could not source parts.
Dozens of electronic component manufacturers in Kunshan, which borders Shanghai, stopped production Wednesday after the restrictive measures were extended.
Shanghai, the center of China's worst outbreak since the pandemic began in Wuhan in early 2020, reported 27,719 cases on Wednesday, up slightly from 26,330 on Tuesday, according to data released Thursday.
In late March, authorities imposed a two-stage lockdown that was expanded to include the entire city of 26 million.
An official close to China's Center for Disease Control and Prevention has expressed concern over the tightening of controls on the health system. The official, who declined to be named, said: “From a medical point of view, I don't think the zero-Covid policy is more viable. Shanghai is short of medical professionals to measure test results and beds to host patients. "
Many residents struggled to gain access to food and medical supplies at the onset of isolation, and others said these supplies began to dwindle. But people all over China have started buying basic necessities in bulk.
Economists at Nomura, the Japanese bank, estimated that 45 Chinese cities and 373 million people were under full or partial lockdown, compared to 23 cities and 193 million people a week ago.
Xinhua called on citizens to endure the "temporary inconvenience" of isolation. "Only when the pandemic is controlled will we be able to protect people's lives … and create favorable conditions for normal production".
(Extract from the foreign press review by eprcomunicazione )
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/in-cina-la-strategia-zero-covid/ on Sun, 17 Apr 2022 05:36:11 +0000.