Odd. Last week the Guardian/Observer was arguing that China had to alter its trajectory on zero-covid. Having done so, at least to some extent, this week the Guardian/Observer has clearly thought through some of the implications of a rapid change of policy. Because:
The problem, epidemiologists warn, is that Beijing's stance does not reflect studies on the impact of Omicron, and the country is ill-prepared for a wave of deadly Covid infections that it may soon face.
...
Omicron has proved less deadly as it spread across countries such as Britain, but by the time it had become dominant, about 95% of the UK population had some form of antibodies from vaccines or previous infections, Bauld said.
China has relatively low vaccination and booster rates, particularly among the vulnerable elderly – only 40% of the over-80s have had booster shots. Almost no one has natural antibodies from previous infections.
China's healthcare system was weak and patchy even before the pandemic and has been undermined by years of fighting Covid.
As noted last week a too rapid change in the policy could result in dismal outcomes. Indeed the Guardian/Observer notes the same:
A spring outbreak in Hong Kong, which has a much stronger healthcare system, offers a grim forecast of what China could face if it mishandles opening up.
"There were a large number of deaths in Hong Kong, despite a relatively small outbreak," said Martin Hibberd, professor of emerging infectious diseases at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.
"While the data suggests that Omicron is much less severe than Delta, we have seen in Hong Kong how deadly Omicron can be where there is no history of past exposure [infections] and limited vaccinations in the vulnerable groups such as the elderly."
In the largely unvaccinated elderly population, death rates were similar to those in the UK during the first wave of the pandemic, Julian Tang, a clinical virologist at Leicester University, said in the British Medical Journal in March.
Another piece in the Guardian notes:
If Xi allows further easing of controls, China risks being plunged into a devastating national Covid outbreak that would probably claim tens of thousands of lives at best – hundreds of thousands at worst – and temporarily overwhelm a patchy health system. After nearly three years of isolation from the world and from Covid, China's population is extremely vulnerable to the disease, with almost no natural immunity. A lacklustre vaccination programme, using domestic vaccines that are not as effective or long-lasting as those developed in the west, has not done enough to bolster those defences.
Just two-thirds of people have had a booster shot, and less than half of over-80s. The government is pushing to address this but Covid is likely to spread at a rate that outpaces even China's impressive mobilisation abilities. That could in itself cause a popular backlash.
There's no good solutions in this, only bad and worse, but shifting from zero-Covid to a much laxer regime of constraints is a gamble in itself. And as the Guardian/Observer notes that:
There may also be health implications. China's easing of restrictions was welcomed by the World Health Organization, but its director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, also warned about the risks of new variants developing in any large population not protected by vaccination.
"Gaps in testing ... and vaccination are continuing to create the perfect conditions for a new variant of concern to emerge that could cause significant mortality," Tedros said on Friday.
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