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Old 11-28-2022, 03:09 PM   #21
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Pretty sure the covid zero policy has less to do with covid and more to do with having the right and ability to lock up any group or individual at essentially the push of a button.
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Old 11-28-2022, 08:55 PM   #22
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Why are they still pursuing this ridiculous Covid-zero policy? Is it just a face-saving kind of thing?
I actually think it's a numbers thing. We need to remember the population in China is ridiculously huge. If they just let it be, we're looking at their government essentially saying it's okay with them if 1.5M of their people die. The CPC isn't as evil and ruthless as some in the west believe. Projections also that ICU admissions would increase by 15X. Like the situation we found ourselves in when people were getting surgeries and treatments cancelled to make room for covid patients, it's not a fun outlook for the healthcare system to have to plan for or the actual people affected by not getting the care they need.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1524050859054616576

There's really no easy answer here in my opinion at least. I believe China has done way better than the west for the first 2 years or so because they've prevented the kind of deaths we've seen in the west but obviously it came at a cost which is right now, Chinese in China have had enough of this ####. I am of the opinion China will need to stop with this covid zero stuff but I also believe once they do, there's going to be a lot of deaths. For me this reality is sad as I have family there and I'm also ethnically Chinese and feel close to that country and the people despite me being a proud, born and raised Canadian.
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Old 11-28-2022, 09:18 PM   #23
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The problem is that at some point the majority of the population will get it. A 1.5 million person death rate roughly .1% is not terrible.

The strategy at this point as to be vacinate, boost and then slowly manage case numbers to try to maintain hospital capacity

By comparison 1.5 million dead is a success. The US is over 1 million dead. India is estimated at over 4 million.
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Old 11-28-2022, 09:27 PM   #24
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Pretty sure the covid zero policy has less to do with covid and more to do with having the right and ability to lock up any group or individual at essentially the push of a button.

I honestly don't know how people think it's about "control". It's not some grand conspiracy to do this to control the people. China is a crazy populated country and for decades they've looked to grow their economy, which they've done in spades. Lockdowns, while to some look ridiculous, what can you do when your population is so densely concentrated? Let it overwhelm your society? How did that go in the Scandinavian when they first tried it out? I'm not pro-China by any stretch but they're in a different conundrum vs. most industrial countries. This is hurting them just as much as the alternative of allowing complete freedom and have the virus mutate further. There's no grand control conspiracy that the freedom convoy spews. Each country is trying their own thing that best suits them with this book that hasn't been written.
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Old 11-28-2022, 09:39 PM   #25
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I actually think it's a numbers thing. We need to remember the population in China is ridiculously huge. If they just let it be, we're looking at their government essentially saying it's okay with them if 1.5M of their people die. The CPC isn't as evil and ruthless as some in the west believe. Projections also that ICU admissions would increase by 15X. Like the situation we found ourselves in when people were getting surgeries and treatments cancelled to make room for covid patients, it's not a fun outlook for the healthcare system to have to plan for or the actual people affected by not getting the care they need.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1524050859054616576

There's really no easy answer here in my opinion at least. I believe China has done way better than the west for the first 2 years or so because they've prevented the kind of deaths we've seen in the west but obviously it came at a cost which is right now, Chinese in China have had enough of this ####. I am of the opinion China will need to stop with this covid zero stuff but I also believe once they do, there's going to be a lot of deaths. For me this reality is sad as I have family there and I'm also ethnically Chinese and feel close to that country and the people despite me being a proud, born and raised Canadian.
Agreed. Of course the government will be concerned about public perception of the their stewardship of society through the pandemic, but just look at the stats in a place like Taiwan to see what the spike in infections per day and death rate looks like when somewhere comes out of zero covid measures. China has no doubt saved millions of lives with zero covid so far, but they would still face huge numbers of people getting seriously ill or dying by giving up after what has already been a long period of public sacrifice.

In China the social contract is quite different as there is a more Confucian understanding of the state having a paternalistic role in ensuring well-being of the people by setting good rules and ensuring order, even if that doesn't really make people happy at the time. Unlike a Western context where government is more expected to regulate with minimal intrusion on individual liberties, transfer of risk to the individual isn't so easy in the Chinese scenario. Legitimacy in Chinese government roles depends upon trust in ensuring well-being in the long run rather than just right now. The problem is they're under circumstances in which maintaining zero covid and opening up are both options that present serious problems for well-being, short-term and long-term.

My hope is that we'll see some kind of compromise where the government will announce conditions or a timeline for reopening, or they will devolve some more authority to provincial governments along with targets for them to meet in loosening restrictions as they ramp up more capacity in the health system and vaccination among the elderly so they can navigate the situation with minimal harm to people's health, the economy, and social well-being.
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Old 11-28-2022, 09:46 PM   #26
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How bad is the situation in India as far as Covid these days? They’ve got the same population as China (soon to be more, if not already). But they’re not pursuing this strategy and it seems decent?
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Old 11-28-2022, 09:53 PM   #27
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How bad is the situation in India as far as Covid these days? They’ve got the same population as China (soon to be more, if not already). But they’re not pursuing this strategy and it seems decent?
India has ~100x more deaths than China. Seems decent?

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

They are also thought to have drastically undercounted.

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India reported 481,000 COVID-19 deaths in 2020 and 2021. But William Msemburi, technical officer for WHO's department of data and analytics, said on Thursday that the toll is vastly higher, with 4.74 million deaths either directly or indirectly attributable to the pandemic — although Msemburi said that figure has a wide "uncertainty interval," ranging from as low as 3.3 million to as high as 6.5 million.
https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsan...s-the-who-says
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Old 11-28-2022, 09:56 PM   #28
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The problem is that at some point the majority of the population will get it. A 1.5 million person death rate roughly .1% is not terrible.

The strategy at this point as to be vacinate, boost and then slowly manage case numbers to try to maintain hospital capacity

By comparison 1.5 million dead is a success. The US is over 1 million dead. India is estimated at over 4 million.
Another substantial difference with how China views infections may also be that we're now at a point where research is indicating that covid infections present medium and long-term risks of serious health problems emerging, even for people who only suffer mild symptoms. Repeat infections also increase the risk of severe health issues. This is a potentially huge health crisis that will be faced globally in coming years/decaded with potentially large costs in addition to the immediate deaths and illnesses. In the West, the cats already out of the bag on that and whatever has been sown will end up having to be reaped at potentially great expense down the road. China's not in that situation yet, and they now will be looking at the data about the medium and long-term risks that really wasn't so available earlier on.
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Old 11-28-2022, 10:02 PM   #29
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India has ~100x more deaths than China. Seems decent?

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

They are also thought to have drastically undercounted.


https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsan...s-the-who-says
How many from a couple years ago though? Surely all those deaths aren’t from the last few months. I know they were struggling a couple years ago, right when we started seeing vaccines.
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Old 11-28-2022, 10:04 PM   #30
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Another substantial difference with how China views infections may also be that we're now at a point where research is indicating that covid infections present medium and long-term risks of serious health problems emerging, even for people who only suffer mild symptoms. Repeat infections also increase the risk of severe health issues. This is a potentially huge health crisis that will be faced globally in coming years/decaded with potentially large costs in addition to the immediate deaths and illnesses. In the West, the cats already out of the bag on that and whatever has been sown will end up having to be reaped at potentially great expense down the road. China's not in that situation yet, and they now will be looking at the data about the medium and long-term risks that really wasn't so available earlier on.
That implies a 50 year lock downs though. Not getting means always being locked down at least at the population level.
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Old 11-28-2022, 10:10 PM   #31
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That implies a 50 year lock downs though. Not getting means always being locked down at least at the population level.
Yeah, that's clearly not feasible. It's just a situation without a really good solution. Maybe it was initially expected that by this stage the virus would have gone the way of so many other outbreaks. Instead we're going through umpteen variants and it's still everywhere. Either way, they're going to have to assess the costs of opening up vs. the status quo and accept a lot of undesirable outcomes.
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Old 11-28-2022, 10:12 PM   #32
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Agreed. Of course the government will be concerned about public perception of the their stewardship of society through the pandemic, but just look at the stats in a place like Taiwan to see what the spike in infections per day and death rate looks like when somewhere comes out of zero covid measures. China has no doubt saved millions of lives with zero covid so far, but they would still face huge numbers of people getting seriously ill or dying by giving up after what has already been a long period of public sacrifice.



In China the social contract is quite different as there is a more Confucian understanding of the state having a paternalistic role in ensuring well-being of the people by setting good rules and ensuring order, even if that doesn't really make people happy at the time. Unlike a Western context where government is more expected to regulate with minimal intrusion on individual liberties, transfer of risk to the individual isn't so easy in the Chinese scenario. Legitimacy in Chinese government roles depends upon trust in ensuring well-being in the long run rather than just right now. The problem is they're under circumstances in which maintaining zero covid and opening up are both options that present serious problems for well-being, short-term and long-term.



My hope is that we'll see some kind of compromise where the government will announce conditions or a timeline for reopening, or they will devolve some more authority to provincial governments along with targets for them to meet in loosening restrictions as they ramp up more capacity in the health system and vaccination among the elderly so they can navigate the situation with minimal harm to people's health, the economy, and social well-being.
I think if the CPC goes and communicates an exit strategy, with timelines, the citizens will be happy. Like you said, the government there plays a much more paternalistic role (which the citizens appreciate, which leads to trust) which I get it, is hard for westerners with no ties to Asian culture to understand because its polar opposite from what our individualistic societies promote, but if the government can come out and say okay, here's the plan to actually get out of this situation, they'll calm down. Like I said I believe China has planned the first 2 years well - it's the exit they've effed up on.

Whatever ends up happening, my bet is on China being just fine. People would be surprised at how many protests actually happen annually across China since it goes completely against the western narrative about suppression, but if one looks into it, there are a lot of protests due to 1.5B people.
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Old 11-29-2022, 06:00 AM   #33
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The CPC isn't as evil and ruthless as some in the west believe.
Really dude?

Go ahead and explain the genocide against the Uyghurs then.

Like any totalitarian regime with power they are literally both those things, and have been for decades. From Tiananmen Square, to the Chinese information firewall, to supporting North Korea, to their current policy of sending Uyghur children to re-education camps…

Jesus. Give your balls a tug and recognize them for what they are.

Not the Chinese people mind you. Their Communist government sucks ass.
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Old 11-29-2022, 06:06 AM   #34
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I swear we have CCP agents on CP who spread their lies every single time a China thread comes up. Good Lord.

"The CCP isn't as evil and ruthless as some in the west believe."

Wow.
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Old 11-29-2022, 06:41 AM   #35
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How many from a couple years ago though? Surely all those deaths aren’t from the last few months. I know they were struggling a couple years ago, right when we started seeing vaccines.
You can see the daily death charts here:
https://www.worldometers.info/corona...country/india/

Sounds like with the undercounting you should multiply by ~10. Don't get the wrong idea, I'm just showing you the data. I am not in any way suggesting anyone should be doing what China is doing.
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Old 11-29-2022, 08:47 AM   #36
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I dunno, we still have no idea what the long term implications of multiple covid infections have on a population scale. What if Long Covid includes a dramatic reawakening of the virus after a dormancy period? What if it's lodging in the brain (as evidenced by the mass loss of smell?) Not trying to be a doomer, but it seems pretty banal and vain to claim that the west did this right when we're still unsure of the ultimate impact of pretty much everyone getting COVID at least once. It seems to have crippled our societal immunity to other viruses, for a start.
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Old 11-29-2022, 08:49 AM   #37
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You can see the daily death charts here:
https://www.worldometers.info/corona...country/india/

Sounds like with the undercounting you should multiply by ~10. Don't get the wrong idea, I'm just showing you the data. I am not in any way suggesting anyone should be doing what China is doing.
Right, but what I mean is that people in this thread suggest they can't just let it run wild because they have a massive population and it could crush them. I know that India had a crisis a couple years ago, but that's basically ancient history today. They're not enforcing a strict lockdown today, have a massive population and they're not seeing cases explode (it seems).
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Old 11-29-2022, 08:50 AM   #38
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I dunno, we still have no idea what the long term implications of multiple covid infections have on a population scale. What if Long Covid includes a dramatic reawakening of the virus after a dormancy period? What if it's lodging in the brain (as evidenced by the mass loss of smell?) Not trying to be a doomer, but it seems pretty banal and vain to claim that the west did this right when we're still unsure of the ultimate impact of pretty much everyone getting COVID at least once. It seems to have crippled our societal immunity to other viruses, for a start.
That can be true and the CCP can be evil and ruthless at the same time. Genocide, slavery, religious oppression, and "cultural re-education" don't generally have public health benefits.
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Old 11-29-2022, 09:03 AM   #39
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That can be true and the CCP can be evil and ruthless at the same time. Genocide, slavery, religious oppression, and "cultural re-education" don't generally have public health benefits.
I have never supported the CCP, and my comment wasn't thus supporting them. I was calling out the people in this thread who were taking victory laps and saying that we did it right and they're too stupid/ stubborn to change their strategy.

IMO too early to say that, there are still plenty of ways a COVID 0 strategy could be displayed as the best over time, in spite of societal problems caused. I don't want us to be mass victims of Hubris here.
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Old 11-29-2022, 09:28 AM   #40
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I don't know if anybody "did it right," but you certainly see the differences in political values here. I'm glad, just like everyone here, that I do not live in the PRC.

One thing we did do right here was correctly assess when the socio-political problems of Covid became more dire than the public health risks. If you want to talk about long-term risk, look at what has already happened to Canadian politics. Civil society, the small business economy, and local community will take years to recover from this pandemic.

Last edited by peter12; 11-29-2022 at 09:31 AM.
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