Xi Jinping's Covid Conundrum: Surging new wave will kill people, lockdown will kill economy

More and more people are falling sick in China as Covid returns to strike it harder. By June, cases in the Asian nation are expected to surge with as many as 65 million getting infected in week, but the country appears to be determined to not put lockdown to curb the spread. China had lifted its draconian ‘Zero-Covid’ policy in December, but the abrupt decision has backfired on Xi Jinping and his administration as the country which has been witnessing revival in its economy is now also seeing spike in cases merely within months. “But this time, China appears to be determined to press on with normal life as the government focuses on reigniting economic growth,” a report by New York Times said. The health authorities in China have since April reported a resurgence in Covid cases fuelled by the XBB variant. Since early December, China has been prioritising to “living with the virus” policy and it is from then, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention had stopped updating weekly infections. Sudden relaxation of anti-epidemic protocols also resulted in an estimated 37 million new infections weeks later. By January, experts said they believed almost 80 per cent of China’s 1.4 billion population had already been infected in this first wave. For the second wave since April, Zhong Nanshan — a respiratory disease doctor who was among the first to confirm Covid-19’s easy transmissibility — revealed that as per his data, the XBB variant is expected to cause 40 million infections weekly by May, going up to 65 million in June. It is contradictory to the estimates of Chinese health officials who have maintained that the wave had peaked in April. In Beijing, the number of new infections recorded between May 15 and 21 grew four times in just four weeks. Why China is shying from announcing lockdown? Dr. Zhang Wenhong, director of centre for infectious diseases at Huashan Hospital in Shanghai, said that the rise in cases “should not have a huge impact overall on economic activity and life" owing to which China should not choose harsh restrictions and lockdowns. China “should not go too far in taking pandemic prevent measures in response,” he said, adding that lockdown could impact the country’s economy and result in widespread protests. The New York Times report said that Chinese officials appear to be against the idea of strict curbs as Beijing is focussing more on boosting economic growth and job creation. Now, China considers Covid to be a “Class B” illness and officials “have also been trying to reassure the public, saying that the symptoms are relatively mild.” Hospitals in China overwhelmed again There has been a remarkable increase in the visits to fever clinics and hospitals across the country, but the overall number is far lower than that during the peak of the previous epidemic outbreak, a report by Global Times quoted Wang Liping, a research fellow at the Chinese (CDC), as saying. “Based on monitoring data from multiple channels, we believe that the epidemic caused by Omicron XBB series will continue for a period of time, but the overall epidemic situation remains controllable and has a relatively small impact on medical system and everyday life,” Wang said. ‘Shouldn’t worry if China doesn’t’ A report by TIME, quoted Yanzhong Huang, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, saying although only mass testing can detect the true extent of the COVID surge, the population has obtained some immunity from the preceding wave. “We shouldn’t worry if China doesn’t worry,” Huang says. “Public health officials try to downplay the severity of this second wave. The Chinese people seem to have learned to co-exist with the virus. There’s that social adaptability.” With inputs from agencies Read all the  Latest News,  Trending News,  Cricket News,  Bollywood News, India News and  Entertainment News here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.