Friday, February 4, 2022

China's Covid-Free Policy In Context: & a Considertion of Omicron and the Olympics ~~ dmorista

~~ Written by and Posted for dmorista ~~


Introduction:


In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic Taiwan, S. Korea, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Australia all used Zero-Covid policies, more-or-less similar to those China used and is still using, with varying levels of success; but in all cases resulting in among the lowest Covid-19 death rates in the world. These policies included the following measures (implemented in various ways in the different countries):


The Seven Part Covid-Free Methodology

1). Immediately closing their borders to places known to be already sites of infection and eventually, in relatively short order, general border closures.  Currently in China people entering the country have to stay in quarantine for 3 weeks, after being provisionally admitted to enter the country.  For Olympics visitors there is no quarantine for athletes, coaches, staff, and media personnel, who have proof of vaccination, upon entering China.  However, if they test positive for Covid while in China they are subject to a quarantine in their hotel rooms or will be taken in for treatment if they are sick.  The Athletes, coaches and press people are tested every day.  So far members of the Press have by far the greatest positive Covid test rates.

2). Rapid and comprehensive testing for the virus;

3). Quarantine rules that are/were rigorously enforced;

4). Contact tracing using current day communications technologies to the fullest extent;

5). Lockdowns of areas where there are/were confirmed outbreaks that are/were large enough that contact tracing alone was not sufficient to control the outbreak.  These lockdowns are/were maintained until the outbreak had been quelled;

6). The distribution and widespread use of top quality masks;

7). And finally, later when the vaccines became available, widespread vaccination campaigns (though by the time vaccines were available only China still maintained the strict Zero-Covid policy).

An important article in the World Socialist Web Site, posted on December 13, 2021, pointed out, that China has used a Covid-Free policy and has acted to suppress all outbreaks (about 14 so far) that took place after the Chinese first got the original Covid outbreak under control, in mid-April of 2020.  Since then they have used the 7 point program listed above for their Covid control efforts.  The first 6 measures were used during the entire outbreak, the 7th (vaccines) was implemented once Chinese produced vaccines became available.  (See, "The misunderstood—and misrepresented—Zero COVID policy in China", Dec 13, 2021, a scientist, World Socialist Web Site, < https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/12/13/chin-d13.html >)   In addition on the same day the WSWS posted a fine political analysis article that complemented the scientific article about Covid and China’s response. (See, "China’s Zero COVID policy proves that the elimination of COVID-19 is possible", Perspective, Dec 13, 2021, Joseph Kishore, World Socialist Web Site, at < https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/12/14/hluo-d14.html >) 

In the first article,  "The misunderstood—and misrepresented—Zero COVID policy in China", the author points out that most of the original skepticism among serious observers and epidemiologists, about China’s official Covid statistics, has now subsided.  However right-wing commenters and disinformation operatives still scorn China’s statistics.  One way to understand this situation is to recall that other advanced countries, particularly in the East Asia and Oceania region, also used tactics that were variations on the Covid-Free method of controlling the disease on their territories.

The data used to prepare Tables 1 - 7  below begins on April 18, 2020, because in Mid-April of 2020 the Chinese Public Health Agencies reported that they had brought Covid under control in China.  The Chinese statistics report that only 4 Chinese people have died from Covid in the period from April 18, 2020 to the present.  Meanwhile, in the U.S. 860,336 people have died from Covid-19; and of course China has about 4.356 times the population of the U.S.  Thus the rate of Covid deaths in the U.S., between April 18, 2020 and February 3, 2022, has been 936,905.9 times the rate of Covid deaths in China.  This is a stunning difference to say the least; and it says a lot about the competence, concern for the common people, and viability of the rulers in the two societies in question.

Tables 1 - 6: The Cumulative Death Rates and Cumulative Number of Total deaths for 13 Selected Countries from mid-April 2020 - February 3, 2022.


Table 1: Cumulative Death Rates and Total Deaths of 13 Selected Countries from April 18, 2020 to June 11, 2020.



(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >; and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >) 


The other societies that used a Covid-Free policy during the earlier days of the Pandemic include Taiwan, S. Korea, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia, and New Zealand. The Covid-Free methodology requires particularly close coordination between the 7 public health measures used to control infectious diseases.  In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic Taiwan was actually the most successful practitioner of this methodology.  Taiwanese public health and governmental authorities acted quickly, they immediately began interviewing and examining people, and first closed their border with China, and then in general.  Overall they kept their death toll to only 6 and then 7 people all the way up from April 10th 2020 until January 30th of 2021, or for a full 8 1/2 months after the initial cases and deaths occurred in Taiwan. The cumulative death toll and deaths per million then began to rise slowly; but as late as May 22nd 2021 the total cumulative deaths had only risen to 17 and the death rate per million from 0.29 to 0.71.  That was a full 13 months after mainland China managed to bring the initial Covid-19 outbreak under control.  And at no time during that period did the Taiwanese authorities have to resort to a general lockdown of any city, or of any significant part of a city in Taiwan.  However, just 11 days later by June 2, 2021, the Cumulative Death Rate per million for Taiwan had gone up 9 times to 6.25 as the total number of Covid-19 related deaths climbed from 17 to 166; and just a bit over three weeks later, by June 26, 2021, the number of Taiwanese Cumulative Deaths had risen to 632 and rate per million had risen to 25.57 or about 50 - 100 times the rate during the period when the Taiwanese authorities used strict Covid-Free policies.  A couple of months later the Cumulative Death rate per million had risen to somewhat over 35 per million, with around 850 total deaths, a level at which it seems to have stabilized for the time being.  Of course we have to keep these statistics in their proper context Taiwan, as of Jan 20, 2022 had suffered a total cumulative death toll of 851 individuals with a death rate of 35.67 / million; the U.S. on that day had lost 896,557 people to Covid-19 related deaths with a death rate of 2686.32/ million inhabitants.


Table 2: Cumulative Death Rates and Total Deaths of 13 Selected Countries from July 18, 2020 to November 3, 2020.

(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >; and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >) 


Table 3: Cumulative Death Rates and Total Deaths in 13 Selected Countries from January 10, 2021 to April 19, 2021.


(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >; and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >) 

At some point after January 30th, 2021 capitalist business interests began to insist on implementing a set of policy standards that are much closer to the U.S. / Western policy of “Live with Covid”; plus the savage and much ballyhooed policy on many right wing websites, the ugly “Herd Immunity” strategy.  Even the phrase Herd Immunity is a harsh reactionary modification of terminology to refer to a phenomenon that competent epidemiologists and other medical professionals generally refer to as “Population Immunity”.  “Herd Immunity” is a phrase more properly used in Range Science and Wildlife Management studies.

Table 4: Cumulative Death Rates and Total Deaths in 13 Selected Countries from May 22, 2021 to June 26/27, 2021.


(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Hannah Ritchie et. al., Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >; and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >) 


When we look more carefully at the statistics we notice that in addition to Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Australia all had quite low Cumulative Covid-19 Death Rates per Million, for periods ranging from a few months to over a year.  Then the Death Rates rise sharply and seem to more or less stabilize at a much higher rate, though still quite low when compared to the disastrous Death Rates in Germany, France, the U.S., and Brazil.  Japan’s data is somewhat muddier as the Death Rate climbed relatively steadily over the time period discussed here.  New Zealand, which has the advantage along with Australia, of relative isolation, still has only seen its Cumulative Death Rate per Million climb to 10.34, rising from a long steady rate at around 5, as of the February 2nd, 2022 figures.


Table 5: Cumulative Death Rates and Total Deaths in 13 Selected Countries from August 18/19, 2021 to November 3, 2021.



(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Hannah Ritchie et. al., Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >; and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >) 


Both Hong Kong and Australia experienced early rises in their Cumulative Death rate with inflection points in the late summer of 2020, and then had their Death Rates and total cumulative death totals rise again..  Tables 1 and 2 demonstrate that Hong Kong maintained the second lowest Death Rate of 0.53 / million with only 4 total deaths from Covid the lowest rate in the early period, other than for Taiwan; later Hong Kong’s rising  Death Rate reached a level of 13.11 per million, 25 times as great as it had been, by September of 2020.  By February of 2021 Hong Kong’s Cumulative Death Rate had risen to above 25, it currently stands at 28.2 / Million or 53.2 times the rate the Chinese City-State maintained up until June of 2020.  Nonetheless Hong Kong, that reached a cumulative mortality level of 209 in April of 2021, has only seen an additional 4 deaths since that time, with a cumulative death toll of 213 people, and a death rate per million of 28.2, the third lowest among the developed societies with accurate statistical reporting, after China and New Zealand. (See, “Hong Kong is clinging to 'zero covid' and extreme quarantine. Talent is leaving in droves”, Dec. 27, 2021, Theodora Yu & Shibani Mahtani, The Washington Post: “Hong Kong doubles down on Covid restrictions to fall into line with mainland China; … ”, Oct. 28, 2021, The Guardian: “Singapore starts to reopen for travel, as 'zero covid' clips wings of rival Hong Kong”, Aug. 20, 2021, Shibani Mahtani, Washington Post) 






 

 


Tables 1 and 2 demonstrate that Australia’s Cumulative Death rate rose from the range of 4 / million, as late as July of 2020, to levels in the mid 30s, or 8 ½  times the death rate maintained in the first few months. However the really big change for Australia came when the Delta Variant overwhelmed the country’s health care system and its attempt to keep pursuing the Covid-Free Policy.  The Death Rate per million and the total cumulative death numbers climbed significantly when Australia largely abandoned its efforts to maintain a Covid-Free situation in the summer of 2021 as the Delta Variant entered the country and its Zero-Covid measures proved to not be up to the task of contending with the Delta Variant of Covid-19.. (See, “Why the Delta Variant Could End Australia’s Pursuit of ‘Covid Zero’ ”, July 2, 2021, Updated Oct. 4, 2021, Damien Cave, New York Times, at < https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/02/world/australia/delta-covid-zero.html >: “Australia plots path beyond 'covid zero' ”, Aug. 24, 2021, Michael E. Miller, Washington Post: “Australia's prime minister compares coronavirus exit strategy to 'The Croods' movie”,

Aug. 24, 2021, Adela Suliman, Washington Post: “How Vaccine Chaos Left a Covid-Zero Haven Locked Down and Exposed”, July 14, 2021, Bloomberg.com, at <       https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-14/australia-s-covid-zero-strategy-reaches-limit-with-no-plan-b >).  Eventually Australia’s Cumulative Death rate per million rose to 115.48 as of January 20, 2022 or 31.4 times the rate during the early period, specifically as of May 3, 2020.


South Korea maintained a death rate of under 7 until the Autumn of 2020, then the rate began to climb and by February of 2021 it reached the 30s where it more or less stabilized until late summer of 2021.  Then it rose again sharply reaching 126.71 by January 20th of 2022.  So by February of 2021, and the next few months, the death rate in S. Korea reached 5 times the rate of the early months; and by January 20 of 2022 the death rate was 28 times that of the early period.  Finally Singapore, which had maintained a cumulative death rate of around 5 or 6 until late June of 2021, saw a rise in the death rate that largely occurred in the period from November 2021 until the present.  Now Singapore’s cumulative death rate is 154.94 or about 76.7 times the City State's death rate per million as of April 18, 2002, it also reached 33.83 times the death rate per million as of June 11, 2020, that was 4.58 per million.  Singapore managed to keep its death rate per million low, staying in the 5 per million level for several months, and finally rising to 6.42 per million on June 16, 2021.  However, after continuing to rise gradually until September of 2021 it rose precipitously to 81.05 per million by November 3, of 2021 when the cumulative number of deaths rose from 59 to 442.  It rose still further to 154.94 per million with a cumulative death toll of 845 by January 20, 2022. (See, “Singapore starts to reopen for travel, as 'zero covid' clips wings of rival Hong Kong”, Aug. 20, 2021, Shibani Mahtani, Washington Post)


Table 6: Cumulative Death Rates and Total Deaths in 13 Selected Countries from December 27/28, 2021 to February 2/4, 2021.


(* Latest Value for U.S. Cumulative Covid Deaths, updated to Feb 4, 2022.  Obtained from MSNBC; ** Value was calculated by author, using the ratio for U.S. Cumulative Deaths for Feb 3 divided by Cumulative Deaths for Feb 4, that value is 1.005276.  Then that ratio was multiplied by the value for the Cumulative Death Rate / Million from February 2, 2022)


(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Hannah Ritchie et. al., Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >: and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >) 


Some people are able to visualize and interpret this sort of information better from Graphs.  Below are 2 Graphs one for the Cumulative Death Numbers from Covid-19 from Jan 2020 - February 2022, and another one with the Cumulative Death Rates per Million from Covid-19 from Jan 2020 - February 2022.













Graph 1: Cumulative Number of Deaths from Covid-19 from January 2020 to February 3, 2022


(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Hannah Ritchie et. al., Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >: and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >): 













Graph 2: Cumulative Number of Deaths per Million Population from Covid-19 from January 2020 to February 3, 2022

(Source: “Coronavirus (COVID-19) Deaths”, “Daily confirmed deaths per million people”, Hannah Ritchie et. al., Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths?country=CAN~DEU~FRA~BRA~CHN~USA#cumulative-confirmed-deaths-per-million-people >: and , “What is the cumulative number of confirmed deaths?” “Cumulative Confirmed Covid-19 Deaths”, Updated Daily, Hannah Ritchie et. al, Our World in Data, at < https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths >)


The two graphs clearly show that there are two groups of countries; one with high death numbers and/or death rates; and the other one with low death numbers and/or death rates.  The real division is between Brazil, the U.S., France, Germany, and Canada; that all have relatively high death rates per million (ranging, as of February 02, 2022, from 2,940.75 per million for Brazil, to the relatively low 898.58 per million for Canada on that date) as compared to the eight East Asian and Oceanian nations.  Those eight countries reported death rates per million ranging, as of February 02, 2022, from 3.21 per million for China to 157.51 per million in Singapore.  Three of the eight low death nations report extremely low death rates per million, China at 3.21 and New Zealand at 10.34, and Hong Kong at 28.4.  New Zealand saw a rise from a death rate of about 5 per million to around 10 per million in late 2021.  New Zealand has, officially, stopped using the Zero-Covid policies they had used for well over a year and a half.  This change was reportedly made in response to the Delta Variant entry into the country.  (See, “Battling Delta, New Zealand Abandons Its Zero-Covid Ambitions”, Oct 4, 2021, updated Nov 8, 2021, Natasha Frost, New York Times, at < https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/04/world/australia/new-zealand-covid-zero.html >)


 

Thus the facts seem to be that the difference between China and other places that used the Zero-Covid measures previously is that Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia  and South Korea have modified the strictness of those measures.  After the modifications and the abandonment of the most stringent Zero-Covid policies each of those countries experienced a rise in the death rate per million and a significant rise in the total cumulative number of deaths from Covid.  China continues to pursue very strong and strict Zero-Covid measures and recently locked down the city of Anyang that has some 5.5 million inhabitants.  Anyang joins Xian, with 14 million inhabitants and the site of the famous Terra Cota Warrior archeological project, and Yuzhou, with some 1.1 million residents.  Tianjin, another city with an important archeological site and that has some 14 million inhabitants, was under a set of localized lockdowns, that have not been lifted.  The Omicron variant has been discovered in Anyang, but not in the other cities.  (“China locks down a third city ahead of Olympics, confining 5.5 million more people to their homes”,  Jan 11, 2022, Ken Moritsugu, Associated Press, (accessed at PBS Newshour < https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/china-locks-down-a-third-city-ahead-of-olympics-confining-5-5-million-more-people-to-their-homes >)  


The Corporate Controlled Media in the U.S. has been quick to report on supposedly vicious and barbaric practices used in China in controlling the latest Omicron Variant outbreaks, particularly the recent lockdown of Xian, which ended a few days ago..  The New York Times reported abuses and problems in Xian, noting that: 


“As of Wednesday (Jan 12), more than 20 million people remained confined to their homes in at least five cities around China.


 “On Wednesday (Jan 12), officials in Tianjin ordered a second round of mass testing of all 14 million residents.  …. 


 “The surge in infections even before the arrival of thousands of athletes, journalists and officials underscores the challenge Chinese organizers face in trying to hold the Games while sticking to Beijing's 'zero Covid' standards.  …  


“Feb. 4, would be the most extraordinarily restricted large-scale sporting event since the start of the pandemic.

“People who are unvaccinated will have to spend their first 21 days in Beijing in solitary quarantine. Fully vaccinated participants will be required to remain in a tightly managed ''closed-loop' bubble from the moment they arrive in Beijing to the time they leave. They also must present two negative tests before arrival, take tests daily and submit health reports to the authorities using a mobile app.   ….

“For the Chinese government, a lot is at stake. Beijing's zero-tolerance approach relies on mass testing, stringent border controls, expansive surveillance, contact tracing, extensive quarantines and lockdowns to tame sporadic outbreaks.

“That strategy has drawn criticism at times, as in the city of Xi'an last month, when residents complained of food shortages and being denied urgent medical care. But it retains widespread public support. ….

“This month, China ordered the cancellation of more than two dozen scheduled flights from the United States after several passengers tested positive for the coronavirus after arriving in China. The government also recently stepped up its already onerous restrictions for inbound travelers.   ….

“Recognizing the challenge, some Chinese health experts have recently backed away from emphasizing the 'zero Covid' goal.

'' 'Right now we don't yet have the ability to ensure that there are zero local cases,' said Liang Wannian, a senior official of China's National Health Commission, according to state media reports. 'But we do have the ability and the confidence to quickly extinguish local cases when we find them.' 

“Even with China's formidable contact-tracing capacity and high vaccination rates, Omicron could prove especially elusive, given the short window in which positive cases can be detected. Studies have also suggested that the two major Chinese vaccines, made by Sinovac and Sinopharm, are not as effective in preventing infection of the Omicron variant. (Chinese authorities have so far approved only Chinese vaccines.)''

(See, “Zeal in China For Zero Covid Is Taking a Toll”, Jan. 13, 2022, Li Yuan, New York Times: and “The Beijing Olympics Aren't All Fun and Games”, Jan. 30, 2022, New York Times: “Beijing Olympics mired in geopolitical tension”, Feb. 3, 2022, Peter Symonds, WSWS, at < https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/02/03/olym-f03.html >)

The “Zeal in China For Zero Covid Is Taking a Toll” article also reported on two deaths caused, at least in part, by health care workers holding firm to Covid-Free standards and to reports of other abuses, related by disgruntled people.  

Reactionaries all constantly bitterly criticize China; and they consistently write that China’s statistics on Covid (and everything else) are not reliable.  But they are not so quick to attack the statistics from Singapore, Taiwan, New Zealand, Australia, and South Korea.  Essentially, what has developed, everywhere but China, is that business interests have allied with the upper 10% or 20% of the socioeconomic hierarchy to impose work and social conditions that are very favorable for them.  But these arrangements are not favorable for the bottom 80% or 90% of the socioeconomic hierarchy of the population.  This is not to say that many working class and middle class people are not in agreement with these policies, but they don't play a significant role in formulating or legally enforcing these policies.


The Omicron Variant Enters China, the Beijing Olympics, and the Lunar New Year Holiday for 2022


There are numerous reports that claim that now China is suffering under the highest wave of Covid-19 outbreaks since the original disease outbreak was brought under control in Mid-April of 2020.  And the highly transmissible Omicron Variant of Covid-19 has now appeared, albeit in small numbers, in several places in China.  The cities of Anyang, with a population of around 1.5 million and Yuzhou, with a population of around 250,000 are still under total lockdown.  The much larger cities of Xian and Tianjin, both with urban areas with around 14 million (that is close to the size of metropolitan New York City, btw) have both come out from a total lockdown in the case of Xian, and a strict limited lockdown in Tianjin.  The total number of Omicron Variant cases in China is in the low few hundred range, this compares to millions in the U.S.  There have been no reported deaths from Covid in China in recent months while an average of about 2,000 people die a day from Covid in the U.S.  Similar magnitudes of infection and death have occurred in the other major countries of the West, in Europe and elsewhere.


There are immense problems facing the Chinese administration, with the Omicron Variant now making some entry into the country, and the Winter Olympics scheduled for Beijing beginning on February 4th.  The Chinese government has decided to continue pursuing its Covid-Free policy with its attendant travel restrictions, lock-downs, quarantines and contact tracing operations.  Nearly 90% of the Chinese population is already fully vaccinated, but China's vaccines are pretty much ineffective against the Omicron Variant; while the technologically more advanced American m-RNA vaccines do have some efficacy against Omicron.  Concerning the various people associated with the Olympics traveling to China: “With a few exceptions, all athletes, journalists and other participants in the Olympics are required to be vaccinated or to do three weeks of quarantine and present a negative Covid test before being allowed to enter a 'closed loop' sealed off from the rest of the city."  The acrimony from the West has reached the point that there are: “mounting demands emanating from Washington in particular that China abandon its zero COVID policy—a combination of public health measures that has successfully suppressed virus outbreaks and kept deaths to a minimum. Not only does China’s policy expose the murderous 'let it rip' policy of herd immunity adopted by most governments around the world, including the US, but it has led to fears in corporate circles that China’s public health restrictions will exacerbate global supply chain breakdowns.” (See, “Beijing Steps Up Covid-19 Control Measures Ahead of Lunar New Year, Winter Olympics …", Jan 27, 2022, Sha Hua, Wall Street Journal: “Beijing Olympics mired in geo-political tension”, Feb 3, 2022, Peter Symonds, WSWS, at < https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/02/03/olym-f03.html >)


The 'Closed Loop' mentioned above is a system by which athletes and others from outside China involved with the Olympics will be, housed, transported, participate in events, and generally be taken care of without any contact with the general public of China.  The Chinese Government decided that no tickets will be sold to any events, and that only a small audience of selected people would be permitted access to the venues.  Even motorists who happen to collide with an Olympic transport vehicle in Beijing's famous snarled traffic have been advised to not approach the other vehicle and to wait for a special team to arrive to handle anything from the aftermath of the collision. 


Travel during the Lunar New Year, China's largest holiday, and an event that in pre-Pandemic days typically saw travel by 3 billion or more people, is being discouraged this year; though not outright banned.  Travel in China, for the upcoming Lunar New Year Holiday, is expected to reach about 1.3 billion or 1/3 of the normal pre-Pandemic levels.  The first  “Covid Lunar New Year'', that of 2019, and that took place very shortly after when Covid-19 first emerged in Wuhan, still saw 3 billion travelers.  Some of them were aware of the emergence of the illness and fled to other parts of China and to Europe and North America.  Local Wuhan authorities were strongly criticized and punished for not making the outbreak known to the Central Government more quickly; and for putting commercial interests of the travel industry and the sentiments of the traveling population ahead of larger concerns about what turned out to be a serious disease pandemic. During the next 2 Lunar New Years, those of 2020 and 2021, Holiday travel by residents of China was greatly curtailed.  The near coincidence of the Lunar New Year, the Winter Olympics, and the entry of Omicron into China; after a largely successful 2+ year struggle to contain Covid in China, while it rages in many nations of the Earth, poses a new level of challenge to the Covid-Free Policy. 


There is a wealth of Western, and particularly American, popular press articles about how oppressive the Chinese policies are and how the Chinese population is growing tired of the restrictions of the Covid-Free Policy.  One of the better expositions of this sort is in Top Risks 2022, a report by the Eurasia Group.  The actual standpoint of the Eurasia Group is discussed at some length in this note below1.  The report notes that: “The United States is the world’s most powerful country, the only one able to project military,economic, diplomatic, and cultural power into every part of the globe. It is also the most politically divided and dysfunctional, the most economically unequal, and the least vaccinated of the G7 industrialized democracies."  (Emphasis Added) 


Concerning China the report states that: “The world’s fastest economic reopening and most expansive international aid campaign during the first months of the pandemic has given way to the longest lockdown and most intense inward focus, with 'zero Covid'

 policies … Continuing to use aggressive lockdowns to halt transmission will lead to greater public backlash and economic disruption. …


“China’s zero-Covid policy will fail …


“China is in the most difficult situation because of a zero-Covid policy that looked incredibly successful in 2020 (please see Risk #4), but now has become a fight against a much more transmissible variant with broader lockdowns and vaccines with limited effectiveness. And the population has virtually no antibodies against Omicron. Keeping the country locked down for two years has now made it more risky to open it back up.


“China’s policy will fail to contain infections, leading to larger outbreaks, requiring in turn more severe lockdowns. This will in turn lead to greater economic disruptions, more state intervention, and a more dissatisfied population at odds with the triumphalist 'China defeated Covid' mantra of the state-run media. The country will be stuck in this position at least until it can roll out domestically developed mRNA shots and boosters across the population—at the end of the year by the earliest.  That means a particularly tough time for what pre-Covid had become the world’s primary engine for growth.” (Emphasis added)

(See, Top Risks 2022, Jan 3, 2022,  Ian Bremmer & Cliff Kuchan, The Eurasia Group:

 most of the specific material quoted above is available at, “Risk 1: No zero Covid”, Jan 3, 2022,  Ian Bremmer & Cliff Kuchan, Eurasia Group, at < https://www.eurasiagroup.net/live-post/top-risks-2022-1-no-zero-covid >)



Exactly what will transpire over the next few weeks in China is not entirely clear.  The Top Risks 2022 report, and many articles in the main organs of the popular press such as The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post are gloating anticipating that their predictions will prove true and that China will suffer massive disobedience and dissent from the Covid-Free policies.  There is certainly plenty of grousing in China about the sometimes difficult and arbitrary seeming measures the Central Government has taken and keeps taking.  But there is also widespread realization that if Chinese authorities had instead used the sorts of measures used in the U.S. and other Western nations (that include the “Live with Covid” and the deprecatingly termed  “Herd Immunity” policies), that the death toll in China would be around 3,750,000 million rather than the 4,636 that is the actual case.  We might further  note that there are no armed militias or private armies parading in the streets or taking over public buildings in China, nor are there vicious thuggish characters attending public meetings threatening school board members, teachers, public health officials, and health care workers, nor are there armed “activists” lurking around their homes menacing their families..  We do see various manifestations of those disturbing developments in the United States and other nations of the West.  It certainly can be argued, and right-wingers and American apologists frequently make these arguments, that the Chinese populace does not have the freedom to take their assault rifles to public meetings or to gun control meetings where the parents of slain children appear to discuss ways to bring an end to the endless murders of innocent people by armed nut-cases. Of course, that “lack of freedom” is also true for all the rest of the developed nations of the world as well, not just China.  The naysayers and cheer leaders for late stage Western Finance Capital have forecast chaos and an end to the economic growth of China for decades now, so far they have been wrong time and time again. 


For further information on these issues, see the articles listed below.  They were the main sources I used, for the material in the 3 paragraphs above.  (See, “Welcome to Beijing's Covid Olympics", Jan 28, 2022, Sha Hua. Wall Street Journal (Online): “China Faces Omicron Test Weeks ahead of Beijing Olympics", Jan 13, 2022, Huizhong Wu, Associated Press, at < https://apnews.com/article/beijing-olympic-games-omicron-china-0e87de42d0d62fc3541d0732a6acd194 >: “China struggles with Omicron with just weeks to go until Winter Olympics", Jan 18, 2022, anon, The Korea International Broadcasting Foundation, at 

< http://www.arirang.com/news/News_View.asp?nseq=291716 >:  “Omicron reaches Beijing, three weeks before the Olympics begin", Jan. 15, 2022, Updated Jan. 16, 2022, Amy Qin & Amy Chang Chien, New York TImes: “Dogged Pursuit of 'Zero Covid' Becomes Exhausting for China", Jan 22, 2022, Amy Qin & Amy Chang Chien, New York TImes: “Omicron's arrival in Beijing prompts clampdown ahead of Winter Olympics", Jan 17, 2022, Eva Dou & Pei Lin Wu, Washington Post: “Chinese Cities Battle Omicron And Delta With Large Outbreaks", Jan 17, 2022, anon, NDTV-  original source Agence France-Presse, at < https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/coronavirus-chinese-cities-battle-omicron-and-delta-with-large-outbreaks-2712169 >:  “China faces new COVID outbreak as first Omicron case is reported", Dec 14, 2021, anon, Aljazeera, at < https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/14/chinas-zhejiang-fights-new-covid-outbreak-amid-omicron >:  “China halts Winter Olympics ticket sales as omicron arrives in Beijing", Jan 17, 2022, Eva Dou & Pei Lin Wu, Washington Post: “China battles Omicron outbreak weeks before Winter Olympics", Jan 10, 2022, Helen Davidson, The Guardian, at < https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/10/china-battles-omicron-outbreak-weeks-before-winter-olympics >  “China's Drive for 'Zero Covid' ”, Nov. 10, 2021, Jonathan Wolfe, New York TImes)



.

).


Notes:


1).  The Eurasia Group, and the co-author of the report Top Risks 2022, Ian Bremer, are discussed and  reviewed at SourceWatch.  Concerning the Eurasia Group SourceWatch (see, "Eurasia Group", SourceWatch, at < https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Eurasia_Group >) notes that:


"Eurasia Group has offices in New York, Washington, London, and Tokyo; with about 100 full-time employees. The company also employs a network of 480 experts in 65 countries in Asia, Latin America, Europe & Eurasia, and Middle East & Africa--a profile The Economist magazine calls 'an inspiration for any academic with a seemingly useless degree in political science.' 


"Eurasia Group is best known as a political risk advisory group,  …

"Clients


"It is believed that Eurasia Group currently provides political risk services for the largest global financial and corporate enterprises as well as governments.

"Eurasia Group used to publish a partial list of clients on its website, but no longer does. The most recent copy of this list in the Internet Archive is from September 2005:[7]

"Clients at that time included:


As for Ian Bremmer SourceWatch (See, "Ian Bremmer", SourceWatch, at 

< https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Ian_Bremmer >)  notes that:


"Ian Bremmer is President of the Eurasia Group.

"Bremmer received his PhD in political science from Stanford University in 1994, specializing in nation- and state-building in the former Soviet Union. Bremmer was a National Fellow at the Hoover Institution …  ".

 

Thus we can see that Bremmer was present in the former Soviet Union, at the very time  when the vultures and hyenas of Finance Capital were present to carve up and loot the carcass of the U.S.S.R.  Jeffrey Sachs, who was a vocal proponent of "Shock Therapy '' worked in Russia (the Commonwealth of Independent States), at the same time as when Bremmer was there.  Sachs later admitted that what was done to the population of Russia, when they were massively swindled and the common resources of the Soviet Union were looted by various sharks and conmen, during the processes of Shock Therapy was a disaster.  Sachs has gone on to recant and to advocate for various more positive interactions between the Global North and the people of the poor countries of the Earth. But no such admission by Ian Bremmer.  He moved into lucrative consulting work and founded the Eurasia Group as a means of profiting by providing advice to wealthy and powerful corporations and their owners.  Bremmer falls into the “Realist School” of professionals who advise the wealthy and powerful, advisors who look at the strengths and weaknesses of the various regions and countries of the world for the purpose of expediting exploitation and plunder.  Not with an eye towards achieving a significantly more just and equitable world, but to maximize the interests of his clients in contending with the dynamic and changing conditions that they are facing and will face in the future. 


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