Beijing, January 3of china State media downplayed the seriousness on Tuesday COVID-19 The wave is growing across the country, with its scientists expected to give a briefing to the World Health Organization on the evolution of the virus later in the day.
China’s sudden U-turn on Covid control on 7 December, as well as the accuracy of its case and death toll figures, has come under scrutiny at home and abroad and has prompted some countries to impose travel restrictions.
The policy change followed protests by President Xi Jinping over a “zero COVID” approach, marking the strongest show of public defiance in his decade-long presidency and coinciding with the slowest growth in China in nearly half a century. Is.
As the virus spreads unchecked, funeral parlors report a surge in demand for their services and international health experts predict at least one million deaths this year in the world’s most populous country.
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China reported three new deaths from Covid on Monday, up from one on Sunday. Its official death toll now stands at 5,253 since the pandemic began.
In an article on Tuesday, the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party, cited several Chinese experts as saying that the illness caused by the virus was relatively mild for most people.
“Severe and critical illnesses account for 3 to 4 percent of infected patients currently admitted to designated hospitals in Beijing,” Tong Zhaohui, vice president of Beijing Chaoyang Hospital, told the newspaper.
Kang Yan, head of Sichuan University’s West China Tianfu Hospital, said a total of 46 critically ill patients have been admitted to intensive care units in the past three weeks, accounting for about 1 percent of symptomatic infections.
Local health officials said more than 80 percent of people living in southwestern Sichuan province have been infected.
‘political logic’
The World Health Organization on Friday urged Chinese health authorities to regularly share specific and real-time information on the COVID situation.
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The agency has invited Chinese scientists to present detailed data on viral sequencing at a technical advisory group meeting scheduled for Tuesday. It has also asked China to share data on hospitalisations, deaths and vaccinations.
The European Union has offered free Covid vaccines to China to help contain the outbreak, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.
The Swedish European Union president said on Monday that EU government health officials would hold talks on Wednesday on a coordinated response to China’s outbreak.
The United States, France, Australia, India and others will require mandatory Covid testing on travelers from China, while Belgium said it will test wastewater from planes from China for new Covid variants.
China has dismissed criticism of its Covid data, saying any new mutations could be more contagious but less harmful.
“According to the political logic of some people in Europe and the United States, whether China opens up or not, whether China opens up or not, is the same wrongdoing,” state-run CCTV said in a comment late on Monday.
economic concerns
As Chinese workers and shoppers continue to fall ill, growing concern about growth prospects in the world’s second-largest economy is weighing on Asian shares.
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Data showed on Tuesday that China’s factory activity shrank at a sharp pace in December as the Covid wave disrupted production and hurt demand.
December shipments from Foxconn’s Zhengzhou iPhone plant, disrupted by a Covid outbreak late last year that prompted worker departures and unrest, were 90 percent of the firm’s initial plans, a source with direct knowledge of the matter said. Said.
International Monetary Fund chief Kristalina Georgieva said a “fantasy” of infections in China in the coming months could hurt its economy this year and drag down global growth.
“China is entering its most dangerous week of the pandemic,” warned analysts at Capital Economics.
“The authorities are now making almost no effort to slow the spread of infection and with migration starting before the Lunar New Year, there will not be a major Covid wave in any part of the country at present.”
Mobility data suggested that economic activity was depressed across the country and would likely remain so until the wave of infections begins to subside.
China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism said the domestic tourism market saw 52.71 million trips during the New Year holiday, flat year-on-year and only 43 percent of 2019 levels, before the pandemic.
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The ministry said revenue totaled more than 26.52 billion yuan ($3.84 billion), up 4 percent year-on-year but only about 35 percent of the revenue it made in 2019.
Expectations are high for China’s biggest holiday, the Lunar New Year, later this month, when some experts expect daily Covid cases to have already peaked in many parts of the country. Chinese media reported that some hotels in the southern tourist resort of Sanya are fully booked for this period.