(Beijing) China announced on Sunday that it would no longer publish its controversial statistics on COVID-19, much criticized recently because of their total discrepancy with the current epidemic wave hitting the country.
The National Health Commission, which acts as a ministry, has published since the beginning of 2020 the daily figures of cases and deaths linked to COVID-19, which were relayed every morning by the press.
She did not justify stopping their publication. But these statistics no longer reflected the avalanche of contamination that has overwhelmed China since the abandonment on December 7 of the strict sanitary measures of the “zero COVID-19” policy.
Previously, quasi-compulsory PCR tests made it possible to reliably follow the epidemic trend. But infected people now carry out self-tests at home and rarely report the results to the authorities, which prevents having reliable figures.
“As of today, we will no longer publish daily information on the epidemic,” the national health commission said.
“The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) will publish information related to the epidemic, for reference and research purposes,” she added, without specifying the type or frequency of these future events. publications.
The Chinese, who saw a glaring discrepancy between the contamination of a large part of their relatives, or even their death, on the one hand, and the official statistics on the other, welcomed the announcement with derision.
“False statistics”
“Eventually they wake up and realize they can’t fool people anymore” with understated numbers, writes a user of social network Weibo. “It was about time,” said another. “It was the best and biggest fake statistics manufacturing office in the country,” adds a third.
Another source of controversy which discredited the official statistics: under a new methodology, only people who died directly from respiratory failure linked to COVID-19 are now counted as deceased from the disease.
China has thus announced only six deaths from COVID-19 since the lifting of restrictions.
But many crematoriums interviewed by AFP recently reported an unusually high influx of bodies to be cremated. A situation largely ignored by the Chinese media, but which the authorities are beginning to mention.
The large metropolis of Canton (south), populated by 19 million inhabitants, has thus announced the postponement “after January 10” of the funeral ceremonies.
“If it is decided [par les familles] not to organize a farewell ceremony, then the body can however be cremated directly as in normal times, ”she said in this note published on Saturday evening.
A previous version of the press release referred to “a significant volume of activity recently” to justify the measure. But the mention was later withdrawn, probably due to its politically sensitive nature, the authorities wishing to give the image of a situation under control.
Vaccination is accelerating
Many hospitals are under pressure from the arrival of COVID-19 patients and a shortage of fever and flu medication is hitting pharmacies.
Some local governments, however, are beginning to put forward estimates of the scale of the epidemic.
Health authorities in Zhejiang (east), south of Shanghai, ruled on Sunday that the number of daily contaminations now exceeded the million mark in this province with a population of 65 million people.
Half a million inhabitants are also infected daily in Qingdao (east), a city of 10 million inhabitants, a municipal official quoted by the official press estimated this week.
In the capital Beijing, the authorities spoke on Saturday of “a large number of infected people” and called for “everything to be done to improve the recovery rate and reduce the mortality rate”.
A large part of the over 80s, who are particularly vulnerable, do not have a complete vaccination schedule and find themselves on the front line facing COVID-19.
Vaccination has accelerated in recent weeks, however, according to figures from the National Health Commission.
A total of 23.5 million doses were administered from December 8 to 23, compared to 3.3 million during the previous fortnight – a sevenfold increase.