There is still a month, the Chinese authorities bombarded the chest.
China, one of the last countries to apply a “zero Covid-19” policy, felt a kind of schadenfreude (the pleasure felt in the misfortunes of others) to see that most countries reintroduced partial measures to close the borders to contain the surge of the Omicron variant of Sars-CoV-2.
For Beijing, this was proof that its very strict strategy to fight the spread of the virus was the right one in the face of mutations.
National media were quick to portray the country as the last "impregnable fortress," said Channel News Asia, a Singaporean news channel.
Xi'an like Wuhan?
“People must ask themselves if the Chinese approach does not offer better protection since other countries are starting to reintroduce, them too, travel restrictions in the face of the multiplication of contamination with the Omicron variant”, welcomed again at the beginning of December. the Global Times, a pro-Beijing Chinese tabloid.
But since mid-December, the Chinese “fortress” seems to be cracking more and more.
On December 13, Beijing announced that it had discovered the first two carriers of the Omicron variant in its territory.
Nearly ten days later, nine contaminations by this particularly contagious mutation were officially identified in China.
A number that may seem low compared to other parts of the world, but for a country that prides itself on not tolerating any cases of Covid-19, that's already a lot.
Especially since at the same time, the health authorities are struggling to contain the spread of the virus in Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi province (central China). More than 150 contaminations were officially identified, Sunday, December 26, in this city of 13 million inhabitants which has however been quarantined since Thursday, December 23 after the discovery of ten cases.
The measures deployed in this regional metropolis are the most drastic since the complete isolation of Wuhan at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in January 2020. No one can enter or leave the city, only one person per household is allowed to leave shopping once every two days, all non-essential stores have been closed and tens of thousands of residents have been tested.
Finally, the municipality announced, Monday, December 27, the imminent adoption of new even stricter measures - without specifying which ones.
Beijing also sanctioned six city officials, accused of having reacted too slowly to the explosion of new cases in Xi'an, the origin of which appears to be one of the passengers on a plane from Pakistan.
Local authorities were quick to clarify that none of those who tested positive in Xi'an were carriers of the Omicron variant.
But this is only a small consolation for Beijing because this outbreak proves above all that “even if the epidemic control is excellent in China, flaws in border control allow the virus to spread”, underlines Jin Dong-yan , a virologist at the University of Hong Kong, interviewed by the South China Morning Post.
Omicron vs the Winter Olympics
An imperfect mesh that was enough time of the original strain of Sars-CoV-2 or the first mutations.
But with the arrival of Delta variants and especially Omicron, which are much more contagious, the authorities “must adapt to react even more quickly in the event of new outbreaks being detected”, Jin Dong-yan said.
Some doubt that this is even possible.
“China is going to find it very difficult to maintain its policy of 'zero Covid-19' with the Omicron variant,” said on Twitter Tulio de Oliveira, a virologist from KwaZulu-Natal University in South Africa who was part of of the team that first identified the latest mutation in Sars-CoV-2.
With Omicron, the number of contaminations “typically doubles every two or three days, which makes case tracing - essential if we want to apply a 'zero Covid-19' policy - very difficult”, notes Kwok Kin-on, a epidemiologist from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, interviewed by the South China Morning Post.
To achieve this, the Chinese government “would be forced to allocate even more financial resources to the fight against the spread of the virus, which could seriously slow down China's economic recovery,” said the Financial Times.
This is why Beijing “will have to align with other countries and adopt a policy of living with the virus rather than eradicating it”, said Lawrence Gostin, a specialist in public health issues at Georgetown University. in Washington, interviewed by North American public radio Voice of America.
A choice that the Chinese government refuses to consider for the moment.
First for political reasons.
With the approach of the Winter Olympics, which are due to start in Beijing on February 4, 2022, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) wants to maintain the appearance of a “zero Covid-19” policy that works, believes Leo Poon, a Hong Kong virologist, interviewed by the Financial Times.
There is also no question for the government to change its health course the year when the 20th CCP Congress is supposed to ratify a third term as president for Xi Jinping.
The leader has, in fact, been the main promoter of the “zero Covid-19” policy and abandoning it would be “an admission of failure”, notes Channel News Asia.
An unsuitable sanitary system
The Chinese health system is not ready for a Western-style policy of “coexistence” with the virus either, say health authorities. The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention released a study in late November predicting a “catastrophic explosion” of new cases if the hard line to fight the spread of the virus is dropped. Their model shows several hundred thousand new infections per day and a total collapse of the health system.
“China just doesn't have the capacity to handle such an influx of patients.
The number of nurses per 1,000 people in the United States, for example, is seven times that of China.
And yet, it is already considered that there is a shortage of healthcare workers in North America, ”notes Chen Xi, a health policy specialist at Yale University, interviewed by Voice of America.
The “zero Covid-19” policy is therefore not just a political choice to demonstrate to the world that China is doing better than most other countries.
It is also “a health necessity while waiting for the vaccination campaign to allow the population to achieve a form of collective immunity”, underlines a note from Capital Economics, a British economic analysis firm, cited by Washington. Post.
And this is where the last shoe pinches.
Faced with Omicron, the two main vaccines used in China - Sinovac and Sinopharm - are not very effective, according to recent tests.
Thus, even three doses of the Sinovac vaccine do not offer "sufficient protection" against the new variant, Hong Kong researchers concluded in a study published on Thursday 23 December.
Beijing therefore seems stuck between a “zero Covid-19” strategy which seems ill-suited to highly contagious variants and a shift towards a “Western” approach to the fight against the epidemic which could lead to a health disaster in China.
All this with the approach of a politically very sensitive new year for the Chinese authorities.
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