Why the “zero COVID” policy fails in China: Shanghai recorded another record of symptomatic cases

The Chinese National Health Commission confirmed this Friday the detection of 3,486 new coronavirus positives -3,472 for local contagion-, in addition to 20,782 asymptomatic cases, of which 20,694 correspond to transmissions at the local level.

The eastern city of Shanghai, with 3,200, remained the area in which the most symptomatic infections were added, followed by Jilin Province (northeast, 174).

Xi Jinping's regime insists on its zero-covid policy while trying to resolve one of the weaknesses of the strategy: the low immunization rate among the elderly, one of the most vulnerable groups but also one of the most reluctant to get vaccinated.

The Asian country is currently dealing with the largest outbreaks of covid-19 since the beginning of the pandemic, against which it has applied the same strategy as in the previous two years, massive PCR campaigns, restrictions on mobility and selective or general confinements that this time have been concentrated in Shanghai and Jilin.

Millions of people remain confined to their homes for fear in part that an even greater wave of infections will collapse the health system, a situation that is more likely due to the stocks of older people to be vaccinated.

Refusal of the vaccine

About 40% of Chinese people over 80 have not received any dose of a covid vaccine and approximately 50 million inhabitants over 60 do not have a complete vaccination schedule, according to March data from the Chinese National Health Commission.

These figures represent a mole in China's seemingly successful immunization campaign, which has administered 3.303 billion doses among its population of 1.4 billion inhabitants.

Unlike in other countries, the older Chinese, who did not have a sense of urgency given the low levels of infections in the country, were not the first to queue to receive the injection.

The perceived low risk was joined by fear of the effects of the vaccine among the elderly, many of them with chronic ailments, despite repeated explanations from the Chinese health authorities, who recently referred to these underlying diseases to alert the elderly.

“Most elderly people have chronic diseases, so if they become infected with coronavirus, the risk of serious illness and death is higher than that of other age groups,” Lei Zhenglong, an expert from the Health Commission, recently warned.

Some local governments have offered discount coupons, gifts or even cash to convince the elderly to get vaccinated, an increasingly pressing urgency as omicron spreads across China.

Fear of Hong Kong's experience

Mainland Chinese authorities are mindful of what happened in Hong Kong in recent months: the former British colony, which had kept the pandemic at bay, suffered a covid wave starting in mid-February that caused an average of more than 100 deaths a day last March in the city of 7.4 million inhabitants.

At the start of that wave, only 43 per cent of the older Hong Kongers of 80, one of the most vulnerable groups, had received at least one dose of the vaccine, resulting in a sudden high mortality rate.

According to data from the state network CCTV released this Tuesday, 74% of deaths in Hong Kong from coronavirus occurred among unvaccinated people.

The reluctance of the elderly to get vaccinated in Hong Kong, which has remained semi-isolated from abroad, has in recent months caused a generational conflict in the city, with younger generations blaming restrictions on the selfishness of their elders.

Tension in Shanghai

The city that suffers from the worst covid outbreak today, Shanghai, has already banned visits to nursing homes on March 1, reports today the Xinhua news agency, while authorities remind seniors of the importance of getting vaccinated.

According to official data, 63% of Shanghainese older than 60 had received a full schedule of vaccination on April 8 and, at the current highest risk of contracting covid, there are problems caused by the confinement itself.

Shanghai, where there are more than 240,000 active cases between symptomatic and asymptomatic, has been confined for two weeks, and its residents have in many cases faced shortages of food and the lack of medical care in hospitals and medicines and treatments, which mainly affects older people.

A recording of a phone call in which an elderly man with chronic illnesses and no food called the overwhelmed local authorities for help went viral on Chinese social media this week before being censored.

The situation is pushing the patience of some to the limit: a group of residents of an urbanization in the Shanghainese district of Pudong clashed with the police this Thursday after the authorities would try to temporarily requisition buildings in the neighborhood to transform them into makeshift quarantine centers.

This is not the first time that there have been riots during the confinement of the city, which for the time being remains without an uprising date.

According to official Chinese accounts, since the beginning of the pandemic, 174,868 people were infected in the country and 4,638 died, the last two in March, which were the first deaths recorded in more than a year.

With information from EFE

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