The wave of COVID-19 is “spreading rapidly” in China, a government epidemiologist advising the government warned on Sunday, following the government’s decision to abandon its “zero COVID” strategy.
Chinese health authorities announced last Wednesday a general easing of health restrictions, after angry demonstrations, and also in the hope of reviving the second economy of the planet, suffocated by the restrictions. Since then, cases have been on the rise.
Shops and restaurants in Beijing were deserted on Sunday as the country awaits a spike in infections with the end of routine, large-scale PCR testing, the ability to self-isolate for mild and asymptomatic cases, and more recourse. limited to confinements.
“At present, the epidemic in China is spreading rapidly, and under such circumstances, no matter how strong prevention and control, it will be difficult to completely cut off the chain of transmission” of the virus, Zhong warned. one of the government’s top advisers since the start of the pandemic, in an interview with state media published on Sunday.
“Current Omicron subvariants are highly contagious. A person can transmit [le virus] to 22 other people,” he added.
The country faces a surge of cases that it is ill-prepared to handle, with millions of elderly people still not fully immunized and underfunded hospitals that lack the capacity to accommodate a large number of patients.
The country has one intensive care unit bed for every 10,000 people, said Jiao Yahui, director of the medical affairs department of the national health commission, on Friday.
She announced that 106,000 doctors and 177,700 nurses would be redirected to intensive care units to deal with the new wave of cases, but did not specify how other hospital sectors would organize themselves.
On Sunday, long queues formed outside pharmacies in Beijing as residents rushed to stock up on fever medication and test kits. Some told Agence France-Presse that they were ordering medicine from pharmacies in nearby towns.
“I’m afraid to go out,” said Liu Cheng, a mother of two living in central Beijing, explaining that “many” of her friends with symptoms or tested positive had not reported.
The number of reported cases in China has fallen sharply following the government’s decision to scrap mass testing.