By Daniel Nardini
The world has moved on from the Covid-19 pandemic. Lock-downs are now more of the exception than the rule. The policy of almost all countries living with Covid is the general rule. We now have effective vaccines to deal with just about every variant, and those who might be most vulnerable are either kept in isolation or get priority in vaccination. Life where I live has basically returned to normal. This is as it should be. No more fear-mongering, and no more harsh draconian government policies that made no sense in the first place. We largely know what Covid-19 and its various mutating forms are, and what to do and what not to do. It is sad that the United States and the rest of the world had taken almost two years to get to this point.
The same cannot be said of China. China’s vaccines are totally useless, and because of this and the current Communist Party of China leadership policies, they are either unable or unwilling to secure the vaccines necessary to effectively combat the virus. The only policy the Chinese government has is total lock-down. These lock-downs throughout parts of the country in fact make no sense from a medical perspective. If vaccines exist, then why not get those? The Chinese government has instead declared a “zero Covid” policy. Which means that the whole epidemic in China or regions in China can be declared over when there are zero Covid cases. This is an impossible goal, and one that is not possible to reach. If there is even one Covid case, tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of people will be locked down until the emergency is declared “over.” This is not possible. To make things worse, if everybody is locked down, then almost no one will be able to get Covid and hence more people will be susceptible and never gain even natural immunity.
The zero Covid policy is the one the Chinese government has adopted, and it refuses to back away from this. If it does, it loses face, and worse most Chinese will be questioning what the point of it is. Truth be told, it is all political. There is nothing medically sound about what the Chinese government is doing, and this not only endangers everyone in China but also the rest of the world. We have to remember that the whole Covid-19 pandemic started in China and the Chinese government allowed it to spread around the world. What if another and even more deadly virus emerges in China, and in an effort to hide it the Chinese government lets this one spread around the world? It is in the sick, dark realm of possibilities. It scarcely bears thinking about.
Not Living with Covid-19
By Daniel Nardini
The same cannot be said of China. China’s vaccines are totally useless, and because of this and the current Communist Party of China leadership policies, they are either unable or unwilling to secure the vaccines necessary to effectively combat the virus. The only policy the Chinese government has is total lock-down. These lock-downs throughout parts of the country in fact make no sense from a medical perspective. If vaccines exist, then why not get those? The Chinese government has instead declared a “zero Covid” policy. Which means that the whole epidemic in China or regions in China can be declared over when there are zero Covid cases. This is an impossible goal, and one that is not possible to reach. If there is even one Covid case, tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of people will be locked down until the emergency is declared “over.” This is not possible. To make things worse, if everybody is locked down, then almost no one will be able to get Covid and hence more people will be susceptible and never gain even natural immunity.
The zero Covid policy is the one the Chinese government has adopted, and it refuses to back away from this. If it does, it loses face, and worse most Chinese will be questioning what the point of it is. Truth be told, it is all political. There is nothing medically sound about what the Chinese government is doing, and this not only endangers everyone in China but also the rest of the world. We have to remember that the whole Covid-19 pandemic started in China and the Chinese government allowed it to spread around the world. What if another and even more deadly virus emerges in China, and in an effort to hide it the Chinese government lets this one spread around the world? It is in the sick, dark realm of possibilities. It scarcely bears thinking about.