China’s Zero Covid Policy, Why Change A Working Formula?

Published:December 29,2021

By staff writer 

China strict restrictions to battle the SARS-CoV-2 virus, used to be universally decried as too draconian, until those same measures became the norm around the world. Now the country’s “zero Covid” policy is under scrutiny, but the governmentshows no sign that it is might change course. Might this policy too turn out to have been inspired?

“Learning to live with Covid-19” is a phrase we hear much now. It has come to mean that countries have accepted that SARS-CoV-2 is here to stay, and existing with it, might be as normal as existing with the flu virus. Living with Covid-19, also means relaxing preventive measures, especially lockdown. 

This is the direction in which many countries in the West, and around the world, have begun to not only point, but to move. There seems a clamour for China to do the same, with all kinds of dark motives, attributed to them, as they show every sign of sticking to their policy. 

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), since January of last year, China has had 130,109 of confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 5,699 deaths. Looked at in isolation, it is of course, a large number of losses, but very low, if compared to other countries. 

It is in fact an extraordinary achievement, for a country of over a billion people, and which moreover, was the first to be hit, without warning, by a then unknown virus.

It is an achievement that owes to the zero tolerance of Covid-19, with everything else, including economic considerations, subordinated to containing it.

That means that any cases, even one, means locking down the affected area, tracing contacts of the infected person or persons, testing, isolating, treating, as necessary, until community transmission is halted, altogether. 

Many countries worldwide are relying on the vaccine rollout to relax restrictions. With 76% of the population already vaccinated, Western commentators ask why China does not follow suit, and learn to “live with Covid-19.”

Rather than scientific reasons, they insist that China holds on to the zero Covid policy, for political reasons, to demonstrate that theirs is a superior political system. The country they assert, has to maintain the policy, to “maintain its legitimacy.”

It does not matter how often, or how many times, China explains that its policy against the virus, will be dictated, not by economic considerations, but by the scientifically determined behaviour of the virus.And it does not matter how many times, ordinary Chinese make it clear that they support their government’s policy.

It is not too dramatic to say that zero Covid approach has saved the country.

China is the fourth largest country in the world, andthe most populous. Had the government paid heed to loud criticisms of the measures it took, at the beginning, when what is now a pandemic, was still an epidemic in China, thousands, if not millions of lives, would have been lost, only for the world to turn around, and adopt the very same measures anyway. 

As for legitimacy, no doubt the Chinese people are as worn down by the pandemic, as the rest of the world, but by and large, they are grateful to their government, for having kept them safe, and trust it to continue doing so.

The policy is constantly tested. Thirteen million inhabitants of the city of Xi’an are now in their sixth day of lockdown. On Monday, authorities announced new infections of just over 160. Not a particularly large number for a city of that size. But left unchecked, the virus could engulf other cities, towns and rural areas. 

There are suggestions that the policy may change, when vaccinations have reached 85%, but for now, it remains zero tolerance.

Instead, thousands of quarantine facilities have been built, and cities are being asked to build more. In Guangzhou, a newly constructed 5,000 room facility, awaits visitors.

There is an irony in Western opinion’s implication that China should adopt its policy to the rest of the world, rather than seeking to better understand China’s approach to fighting the pandemic. 

China is after all, the only country that can be said to have contained the spread of Covid-19. And in many ways, they have learned to live with the virus, it is just that like in many other things, they are doing so in their own way. For them, living with the virus, for now, means a zero Covid approach. 

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