various cities of China decided to relax the strict measures anticovid that unleashed unprecedented demonstrations in recent days. According to statements by officials, now “the conditions are in place for the country to adjust its anti-pandemic measures.”
Vice Prime Minister Sun Chunlan, in charge of supervising the “zero covid” policy, assured this Thursday that the low pathogenicity of SARS-CoV-2 and the high vaccination rate, of more than 90% of the population, among other factors, They have “created the conditions” for the country to “adjust the measures against the pandemic.”
Cities such as Canton and Shenzhen announced in recent hours the withdrawal of various anti-pandemic restrictions and some of their districts will even allow certain close contacts of those infected considered vulnerable to confine themselves at home, which represents a considerable shift from the policy in force during these years.
The strategy, to which China has been clinging for more than two years, consists of the isolation of all those infected, strict border controls, partial or total confinements in places where cases are detected and constant PCR tests on the urban population.
Precisely isolation has been one of the most controversial points, given that cities have to sometimes resort to provisional and prefabricated facilities with poor sanitation and problems with access to medical care.
Canton, which registered protests in the last week against the restrictions, has been dealing for weeks with a regrowth that is producing thousands of new cases daily, figures that in the past would have inevitably led to a general confinement like the one suffered by the cities of Wuhan (central ), Shanghai (east) or Xian (center), among others.
Starting Friday, the Chengdu metropolis (southwest) will no longer require a recent negative test result to enter public places or take the subway. Only a green health pass will be necessary, which confirms that no “high risk” area was crossed.
In the capital, Beijing, which is facing the largest-scale outbreak of COVID-19 in its history and against which it has decreed numerous closures, the health authorities asked hospitals to stop rejecting patients who do not have a negative PCR test. less than 48 hours. There has also been a large-scale closure of sampling booths for PCR tests.
According to agencies like AFPSeveral deaths have occurred in China due to delays in medical treatment caused by anti-covid measures. It was the case of a four-month-old baby who recently died from being quarantined with her father. In the city of Xi’an, a pregnant woman lost her baby at the gates of a hospital that would not let her in because she did not have a test.
In the demonstrations this weekend, these deaths became topical again. On social networks, a message with all the names of the people who died due to negligence due to sanitary restrictions went viral.
But, in the last hours, many cities affected by new coronavirus outbreaks have begun to authorize the reopening of restaurants, shopping centers and schools, clearly leaving aside the strict measures that were in force to date.
In an analysis published Friday in the People’s Daily, an organ of the Communist Party, several health experts supported the measures taken by some local authorities to allow positive cases to quarantine at home. The fact means a radical change with respect to the norms that prevail in a large part of the country, which require that infected people be confined in government facilities.
On Thursday, the industrial city of Dongguan (south) announced that people with “specific conditions” must be allowed to stay at home during isolation. These conditions were not specified.
According to official figures, since the beginning of the pandemic, 5,233 people have died in China, where some studies maintain that “zero covid” has saved millions of lives.
Efe/OnCuba.
