【Guide】
It has been nearly three years since the COVID-19 epidemic has been raging around the world. While countries around the world have announced that the epidemic is over and have taken negative measures to deal with the epidemic, the Chinese government still adheres to the principle of "people first, life first" and insists on epidemic prevention and control.
How to view these two completely different epidemic response strategies, facing the recovery dilemma of the world economy and the relationship between epidemic prevention measures and economic development from the outside world, in an exchange with Observer.com, British economist Luo Siyi expressed his views: "The so-called 'the epidemic in the West is over' is completely nonsense. In the past three years, the Chinese government's zero-clearing policy has saved the lives of 4.6 million people." "Prevention and control are not the cause of economic problems, both in China and in the West , now is the worst time for the world economy in 40 years, and the Chinese economy is still far better than the United States and Europe."
Observer.com: Thank you very much for accepting our interview. It has been nearly three years since the outbreak of the new crown epidemic at the end of 2019. In the past three years, it has become a nightmare lingering in the hearts of people all over the world.
Luo Siyi:
What you said is not entirely correct.
Compared with China, the new crown epidemic is a bigger and more terrifying nightmare for the UK.
China is now the safest place in the world under the epidemic, while the current epidemic in the UK where I live is still out of control.
This nightmarish feeling is not happening in China, and the nightmare is what is happening in the UK.
Over the past three years, I have learned about the current real situation of the new crown epidemic in the West through data and through my contacts with other people in the West.
So it is not accurate for you to say that COVID-19 is a worldwide nightmare, sorry, it is a nightmare outside of China.
Observer.com: However, for some people in China, they think that in the world outside of China, "the epidemic has been declared over" and "people can travel abroad freely".
Luo Siyi:
First of all, the number of people who can travel around the world accounts for only a small percentage of China's population, while the number of people who may lose their lives due to the new crown epidemic accounts for a much larger percentage of the population.
So it is worst that the west preaches this kind of rhetoric, they are willing to kill millions of people for profit.
People in China should understand this, this kind of rhetoric is pure political propaganda concocted by the West.
Observer.com: As you said, in the face of the epidemic, many Western countries chose to announce the "end of the epidemic" and then stopped taking active anti-epidemic measures, while the Chinese government still insists on the "dynamic zeroing" policy. As an observer who has been living in the Western world since the outbreak of the epidemic, how do you evaluate the two different paths chosen by the Chinese government and Western countries in the fight against the epidemic in the past three years?
Luo Siyi:
Let us speak with data.
In China, the death toll from COVID-19 is just over 5,000; in the United States, it has killed more than 1 million people, or 1.08 million, to be exact.
Don't forget that China's population is 4.3 times that of the US.
So, to get an idea of how American-style policies would work in China, we need to multiply the numbers by 4.3.
This means that if China's population death rate is the same as that of the United States, the number of deaths caused by the new crown in China will reach 4.7 million.
According to the latest data, the number of deaths from the new crown in China is 5,226. In comparison, the figure of 4.7 million is shocking.
Can you imagine that 4.7 million Chinese died in the epidemic?
The Chinese government has protected the Chinese people from a sudden disaster.
In contrast, in the United States, life expectancy has decreased by 2.7 years in the past two years.
China's (per capita) life expectancy has now surpassed that of the United States.
The new crown has caused Europe to face its worst health crisis since the Spanish flu pandemic at the end of World War I.
Let's look at the number of confirmed cases.
There are a total of 288,000 confirmed cases in China, compared with 98 million in the United States.
If China's population diagnosis rate is the same as that of the United States, then 425 million Chinese people will be infected with the new crown.
Can you imagine such a situation?
If China implements the "opening up" policy advocated by the United States, 4.6 million Chinese may die as a result.
The zero-clearing policy of the Chinese government has saved the lives of these 4.6 million people.
By the way, the epidemic is still ongoing.
It can be seen from the number of new infections every day that the so-called "epidemic is over" is a complete lie.
Before the interview, I checked the daily number of new infections in China and the United States.
The daily number of new infections in China stands at 2,365, compared with 46,000 in the United States.
Converted by population ratio, multiplying the US data by four times to get the Chinese data, which is equivalent to 162,000 new cases in China every day.
Obviously, the epidemic is not over.
The number of deaths caused by the new crown can also prove this point.
China has just reported two deaths from the new crown pneumonia, which has shocked the Chinese; in the United States, an average of 340 people lose their lives due to the new crown every day.
Converted by population ratio, this is equivalent to China's daily average of 1,130 people.
Two deaths were enough to shock the Chinese.
And if the Chinese government had not adhered to the epidemic prevention policy, 1,130 Chinese would have died today.
The so-called "the epidemic in the West is over" is completely nonsense.
In addition, we must realize that the real cumulative effect of the epidemic is not the death of tens of thousands of people, but the so-called "long crown".
I don't know if the Chinese are familiar with the term "long crown".
"Long-term new crown" refers to the long-term and even permanent damage caused by the new crown to human health.
These sequelae last for at least 3 months.
In the United States, the number of people suffering from the sequelae of "new crown" accounts for 8% of the total population, that is to say, 25 million people are troubled by sequelae.
Converted in proportion to the population, this is equivalent to 110 million people in China.
The situation is quite dire.
Let's give a "long crown" a stricter definition.
According to the official definition, "long crown" means that people's daily activities (due to the sequelae of the new crown) are severely restricted.
Take the data from my own country as an example.
In the UK, 409,000 people suffer from the "long crown".
China's population is 20 times that of the UK.
Converted proportionally, this is equivalent to 8.6 million people in China who cannot live normally for months or even years.
I can give some examples around me.
I know a China expert named Martin Jacques.
His son Ravi Jacques has suffered from "long crown", and it has been two years so far.
Ravi Jacques was once a very talented young man.
He studied at Stanford University on a scholarship to China's top university and is also good at the violin.
Now, if he can get out of bed for 2 hours a day, it will be a very good day for him-the rest of the time, he can only lie in bed with his eyes closed and "watch" TV.
As for those old and infirm people in the West, they are almost always at risk and unable to live a normal life.
Take going to a restaurant for example.
Of course you can say, "You guys need to take precautions, like wearing a mask".
But you can't wear a mask forever, you can't eat in a restaurant with a mask on.
This means that the elderly and infirm must choose between two options: either go to restaurants and risk permanent damage to their health, or give up going to restaurants.
But when they're traveling, it's impossible not to go to a restaurant, right?
Travel is a serious problem.
I am very cautious about the new crown epidemic, I often stay at home and take corresponding precautions.
When the new crown epidemic first broke out, I happened to be out of China.
After learning that the new crown may be introduced into the UK, the research institute I work for provided guidance on epidemic prevention to the staff, including wearing masks, maintaining hygiene, and paying attention to social distance.
So I was well prepared.
In fact, I was also able to help my friends in the UK.
At that time, it was difficult to buy masks in the UK.
I bought masks from China and sent them to friends.
At the time, they were skeptical.
They asked me: "Why do you buy masks from China?" Because the British government's propaganda at the time was that there was no need to wear masks.
Now my friends have changed their minds.
They were very grateful for my actions back then.
Therefore, when the new crown epidemic broke out, I stayed at home and the risk of infection was relatively small.
However, I am not completely free of infection risk.
My wife was traveling to visit our daughter and contracted COVID-19 on the way.
Fortunately, due to the strict precautions she had taken, she had been doing nucleic acid tests for a few days after she went out, and she knew she was infected with the new crown.
Since I was not infected with the new crown at the time, my wife and I lived separately for 2 weeks.
During these 2 weeks we lived in different rooms under the same roof.
I was lucky not to be infected.
In the past two years, my wife has only traveled three times, and one of them infected her with the new crown.
Therefore, the so-called "the epidemic is over", "the new crown is not dangerous", and "people have begun to live normally" are pure nonsense.
Anyway, as I said earlier, I stayed at home during the COVID-19 outbreak.
While I'm not completely immune to infection due to my wife's insistence on going out to see her adult daughter who left home, I'm relatively safe.
But travel is indeed a serious problem.
Whenever I choose to travel, I am at risk of infection, whether I take public transportation or fly.
So, as you can see from the travel issue, our lives have not returned to normal at all.
There are also rumors that as long as you are infected with the new crown once, you can be immune for life.
This is the rationale behind the policy of "herd immunity".
However, this rumor is also nonsense.
The saying "one infection and lifelong immunity" applies to some other diseases, such as smallpox.
However, this statement is not true for the new crown.
There are many people who have been repeatedly infected with the new crown.
In some cases, people have been infected with the new crown as many as 5 times.
During the first two infections, their symptoms were similar to those of the flu, and luckily they did not have the sequelae of the new crown.
But the "Long Crown" found them on the third infection and permanently destroyed their lives.
Therefore, the so-called "everything is normal" is completely nonsense.
The new crown epidemic has dealt a severe blow to the European population, at least in my lifetime, this should be the worst blow that Europe has ever suffered.
More Americans have died from COVID-19 than from the Vietnam War—roughly 30 times as many.
The average life expectancy in the United States has been shortened by 2.7 years due to the new crown, which has never happened in the past 100 years.
It's a disaster.
The pictures selectively presented by the West to the Chinese people are completely lies and hypocritical propaganda.
The reason why Western companies concoct such lies is for profit.
In the West, these companies have allowed countless lives to be lost and countless lives to be destroyed, just for the sake of profit.
Just look at what the people of the West have encountered in the new crown epidemic, you can understand how cruel capitalism is, and how lucky the Chinese people are to live in a socialist country.
Observer.com: As you said, the Chinese government's anti-epidemic measures have saved tens of thousands of lives. This is beyond doubt. At the same time, we have also seen that the epidemic has also brought a great impact on the economy. Many people will therefore question that China's strict epidemic prevention measures will delay economic recovery and put China at a disadvantage in international competition. As an economic expert, how do you view the relationship between epidemic prevention and economic development?
Luo Siyi:
First of all, even you underestimated how serious the problem is in the Western world at the moment, because you said that "the Chinese government has saved thousands of lives."
To be precise, the Chinese government has saved millions of lives, not just "thousands".
And on our side, as I said, 4.6 million lives lost.
Your judgment shows how well protected you are in China.
You support the policies of the Chinese government, but even so you still underestimate how many people the Chinese government has saved in this epidemic.
I'm not criticizing you, it is what it is.
This also gave me a way to think about how many people have misjudged the situation in China under some kind of propaganda campaign aimed at economic issues.
The latest quarterly GDP indicators for China and the United States have been released.
We can look back in the past three years, starting from the third quarter of 2019 to see what happened in the past three years.
That was right before the outbreak.
In the past three years, China's economy has grown by 14.3%, an average annual growth rate of 4.5%, which is indeed slow by China's standards.
But let's compare that to the U.S., which grew 4.7% over that time period, or about 1.5 percentage points a year.
So while her economy did slow down, it was still three times as fast as the US, which slowed down faster than China.
The European region has grown by 2.8% in the past three years, and China's growth rate is five times that of the European region.
Therefore, the current situation is not the so-called economic prosperity of western countries and low growth of Chinese economy.
So it is clearly wrong to think that China is underperforming economically because it saved millions of lives.
Looking at the current situation, what caused the economic problems in the United States?
Did they implement the so-called "blockade"?
Obviously not.
The reality is that the economic problems in the United States are caused by insufficient investment. The investment in fixed assets in the United States has continued to shrink, from 11.3% of GDP 60 years ago to less than 3.8% today.
The slow development of the U.S. economy is due to a lack of investment, while the risk of the Chinese economy does not come from the isolation of the epidemic prevention and control, because overall, the isolation affects only a small number of people, and most people can live a normal life.
If China's economy is going to have major problems, it is mainly when investment falls sharply or the economy lacks stimulus. This is the problem that affects the current economy.
Therefore, prevention and control is not the cause of economic problems, both in China and in the West, and the view that the Western economy is growing rapidly is also incorrect.
This is very bad.
The annual growth rate of the United States is 1.5%, and according to the forecast of the International Monetary Fund, it will decline next year.
Recession is the general trend in the West, even with a slight recovery in 2021 and this year.
In the west, the best-case scenario is slow economic growth, while in a large part of the world, such as Europe, there is a high probability of recession.
Those who believe that the West is saving its own economy by giving up on epidemic prevention are fallacies that ignore the facts.
And those who claim that China has suffered a lot due to epidemic prevention and the West is getting better because of giving up epidemic prevention are also unsupported by facts.
Observer.com: Yes, epidemic prevention and economic development are not an either-or choice. The Chinese government has been optimizing specific measures for epidemic prevention. In your opinion, under the current economic situation, how should we balance the relationship between the two, and how should we view the overall economic situation in the world today?
Luo Siyi:
There are two issues involved here.
First, China protected itself from the massive first wave of the pandemic that the West suffered, saving 4.6 million lives.
This is the most important thing.
And the pandemic itself is changing.
Take, for example, the so-called “Spanish flu” after World War I, which claimed tens of millions of lives—there was little medical equipment for it then we have.
In any case, the epidemic finally subsided in the early 1920s. In the absence of any effective countermeasures at the time, this may be due to the characteristics of the virus itself.
Medical experts may have a better say on this.
This is very important because China has protected itself from the initial waves of the virus with a high death rate.
Then, during this time, they have the ability to gradually put medical facilities and vaccines in place.
At the same time, drugs for targeted treatment are introduced, and medical staff are more experienced in how to treat them.
Because of this, although the new crown is still spreading for a period of time, the toxicity has been weakened compared to the beginning.
We can see the current situation. There have been no new deaths from the new crown in China for a long time, and sometimes there will be one or two deaths occasionally.
However, if you compare the US COVID-19 death figures for the same period with China, you will see over 1,000 deaths.
This shows that China has handled the situation well.
On the economic front, the West is facing severe stagflation—the product of half a century of inflation combined with economic downturn.
Inflation in the US recently reached a 40-year high of 9.1%, which the US claims is due to the war in Ukraine, which is clearly a lie.
You just need to check the timeline to discover the truth.
The inflation rate in the United States has risen from 0.1% in May 2020 to 7.5% in 2022. This happened before the Ukraine war. The latest inflation data reached 7.7%. Before the Russia-Ukraine war, the figure was already 7.5% % - 95% of inflation occurred before the Russo-Ukraine war.
So it is an obvious lie to think that inflation stems from the Russo-Ukrainian war.
Regarding this round of inflation, I do not want to discuss it in depth here.
For a detailed analysis, please read an article I am writing recently, which analyzes in detail the reasons for this round of hyperinflation in the United States and the serious economic consequences it may cause.
According to forecasts, the economic growth of the United States next year will be 1%.
This situation happened when there was no epidemic prevention and control isolation in the whole United States.
Therefore, the economic downturn is not caused by epidemic prevention, but the root cause is the economic policy of the United States.
The difference is that China has implemented a supply-side reform policy. Although there is not much growth on the consumption side, investment growth is guaranteed.
In the United States, although pure consumption has increased, there has been no growth in investment, resulting in very high inflation.
For China, it is necessary to stimulate consumption, because the epidemic prevention has caused a decline in the retail industry to a certain extent.
But China did not blindly stimulate from the consumption side, but stimulated from the supply side.
Therefore, we have reason to believe that China's future economic growth rate will still be faster than that of the United States. This year, it will be even more obvious next year.
Therefore, China's economic recovery has nothing to do with the epidemic and anti-epidemic measures in essence.
If the so-called epidemic prevention and control affects economic recovery, the U.S. economy should be growing rapidly. On the contrary, the U.S. economy is slowing down.
For economic growth, the most important thing is economic policy and investment, and the economy should not be directly linked to epidemic prevention.
Therefore, the Chinese people should first be grateful for the government's performance in the epidemic, and secondly, they should also understand that the Chinese government's economic policies are also successful.
Obviously, judging from the current negative situation of the world economy, now is the worst time for the world economy in 40 years.
It is true that China's economic growth has slowed slightly, but the main reason for the slowdown is by no means the epidemic.
A very important factor is that the world economy is currently in a very negative situation. Against this background, the performance of the Chinese economy can still be said to be remarkable.
(Luo Siyi, author of Observer.com, senior researcher at Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies of Renmin University of China, special author of Observer.com)