China: end of screening in Wuhan as Zero Covid strategy raises questions
This photo taken on August 5, 2021 shows a staff member being tested for nucleic acid for the Covid-19 coronavirus in a company's gymnasium in Wuhan, central Hubei province in China.
Wuhan authorities announced on August 8 the end of the vast Covid-19 screening operation among the 11 million inhabitants of this Chinese city.
AFP - STR
Text by: Stéphane Lagarde Follow
6 mins
Wuhan authorities announced on Sunday the end of the vast Covid-19 screening operation among the 11 million inhabitants of this Chinese city.
The Delta variant is slowing down in China *, but at the cost of new travel restrictions, the tightening of certain neighborhoods, and even of cities in which the population is massively tested.
This while some Chinese experts are calling today for a reflection around the exit of the Zero Covid strategy.
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From our permanent correspondent in Beijing
These are still a minority voices, but voices that count in the scientific community.
On the occasion of a webinar held last Friday and reported by the
South China Morning Post
on Sunday of academics, but also chief epidemiologists of the Chinese Center for Disease Prevention and Control, which is are asked about the sustainability of the Zero Covid strategy.
Scenes of panic and pressure
"
The vast majority of mild cases (of this epidemic resurgence) should not have caused so much panic and pressure,
" said Zeng Zhang.
Because the scenes of panic and pressure, there have been some since the return of protective suits in Chinese streets last month.
Supermarket shelves stormed, villages barricaded as at the start of the pandemic in Wuhan, not to mention the sanctions ... more than thirty officials from four Chinese provinces affected by the epidemic, including a vice-mayor, district leaders and officials of local health commissions have been punished for lack of diligence and efficiency in responding to the health crisis, reports the
Global Times
, which has probably led some local executives to be zealous. This policy of absolute non-tolerance towards the virus also triggered the taking of new restrictive measures this weekend.
China's former health minister stressed the importance of plugging loopholes in guarding off imported infections.
The former minister refuted the idea of "coexistence with the virus," saying that China is capable to eliminate the virus in the country.
- Global Times (@globaltimesnews) August 8, 2021
Travel restrictions and temporary closure
It will now be necessary to wait two weeks without any new infection in the area where you are in order to come to the capital. In order to avoid the return of holidaymakers from infected areas, the
Beijing News
newspaper explained on Saturday,
the capital's epidemic prevention and control team said that any Beijing resident in areas at average Covid risk or high would receive a "code orange" on their cell phone. No way in this case to take the plane or the train, or to pass the police barriers. And the code will only become “green” again if “
no new cases
” were recorded for 14 days in this area. "
Protect the capital at all costs
", as
The head of the Communist Party in the capital affirmed last week
, it is also schools that are thinking of postponing the start of kindergarten in the north of the capital, or cultural places such as the French Institute in Beijing which are temporarily closed.
Public in the stands for Beijing2022
This extreme precaution made it possible to contain the progression of transmissions to more than 600 cases in nearly a month, and without recording any deaths. But the strategy is expensive in the long run and would lose its usefulness with vaccination, advocates for change say. "
We must learn from the experience of abroad
(...)
A new approach will perhaps have to be adopted
" on the occasion of the Winter Olympics at the beginning of next year, added the person in charge of the Chinese CDC.
A position which is still far from being shared by all.
Chinese authorities have won the trust of many Chinese in health matters, curbing the epidemic as the West still grapples with the disease.
After the closing ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics, the official press also pointed out that no case of infection had been reported within the Chinese delegation during the Olympic fortnight.
It will therefore probably be difficult to get the population to accept that they have to “
live with the virus
” again, knowing that Beijing intends to organize the Beijing 2022 games with the public in the stands.
* 81 new cases were reported by health authorities on Sunday August 8
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