China’s methods in moving towards Covid-19 free nation

The leader of the country did not hesitate to ‘lock’ millions of people even though new positive cases only reached 150 people.

A case involving a pregnant woman in China who had a miscarriage and faces difficulties in getting medical treatment after the implementation of the strict ‘lockdown’ has caused a debate regarding the approach taken by China towards zero Covid-19 cases.

The Coronavirus was first detected in the country in 2019 and now they are moving towards ‘zero’ Covid-19 cases.

It has put millions of people in quarantine although Beijing is preparing to host the Winter Olympic 2022 next month.

How does China maintain zero Covid-19 cases?

China has a formula called dynamic-zero to curb the spread of the virus by implementing lockdowns and conducting large-scale tests to immediately detect the Covid-19 virus among its people.

Unlike other places, China residents are prohibited to leave their buildings or they need to remain in their hotel rooms if they are considered high-risk contacts.

Xi’an historical city which is where the Terracotta Army statues are buried underground were previously in lockdown last December where 13 million residents were forced to stay indoors.

The ‘lockdown’ order was implemented when about 150 Covid-19 cases were detected in the city.

Zhengzhou city, which is almost the same size as Xi’an also conducted screening tests for its residents after 11 Covid-19 cases were reported.

Passengers of international flights who arrived in the country will still need to go through a strict quarantine

Meanwhile, mandatory testing means close contacts will be detected and immediately put into quarantine.

BREAKING EXTERNAL CONNECTION

Does it work?

The official Covid-19 cases in China since the start of the pandemic were more than 100,000 cases and it was only a small fraction compared to the one million cases a day recorded by the United States (US), earlier this month.

The official Covid-19 death in China remains below 5,000.

Although the outbreak was detected in Wuhan in early 2020 where many believed it was not openly reported at first, a sense of normalcy has returned to the people there.

“We are not able to put a stop to the rise of local cases. But, we have the ability and the confidence to immediately deter an outbreak when one local case is detected,” said an officer of the National Health Commission, Liang Wannian, to AFP last month.

The border regions especially near Myanmar is almost in a constant ‘lockdown’ and businesses there are moving out from these areas.

Communities in lockdown also complained about the lack of access to food, supply and medical treatment.

Meanwhile, migrant workers had to live away from their families for months due to the movement control order.

Enforcement sometimes provokes outrage, for example when a health worker beats a dog to death after its owner is sent to quarantine.

However, an epidemiologist at Hong Kong University, Ben Cowling, told AFP that China has proved that it is able to sustain zero Covid-19 strategies.

The country had ‘cut off’ ties from the outside world in March 2020 and almost banned foreigners from entering China and since then, travel restrictions have been relaxed slightly.

However, international tourism is not allowed and the government stated that it will not renew the China passport unless the owner has reasonable reasons to travel.

The communist country will not be opened until at least after the Winter Olympic Sports and Paralympic Games in Beijing that are scheduled to start next month with its leaders imposing stringent restrictions before the event.

However, there is a warning issued by researchers from Peking University that China will experience a major epidemic that will overwhelm its medical system if it relaxes the restrictions to the same extent as in Europe and the US.

Even so, an Infectious disease specialist at Hong Kong University, Ivan Hung stated that the second generation of vaccines targeting the Delta and Omicron Varian including the vaccination rate that almost reached 100 per cent are able to combat the Covid-19 virus.

In the scenario, perhaps Covid-19 will be the same as influenza, he said as reported by AFP. - Agency.