China counted 18,000 new cases on Wednesday March 23, two-thirds of them in Hong Kong. These figures seem low when compared to contamination in Europe, a fortiori given the size of the Chinese population, 1.4 billion inhabitants. But for a country that claims total control of the pandemic (the “zero Covid”), it is an acknowledgment of failure and it can become a political issue.
In Hong Kong in particular, the situation is dramatic. The city is currently experiencing the highest death rate in the world. The balance sheet, revised upwards on March 24, amounts to 6,770 dead in the city. Hospitals and crematoriums are overwhelmed. In the rest of the country, the contamination curve has changed in recent days. But tens of millions of people are confined, for example in the provinces of Jilin and Laoning, near North Korea.
Further south, the gigantic megalopolis of Shanghai is testing a somewhat new strategy, a sign of an evolution of the “zero Covid” mantra: despite a thousand new daily cases, there is no general confinement in Shanghai. Only confinements limited to certain districts or buildings with targeted screenings, and the requisition of two stadiums transformed into quarantine centers.
Two major reasons explain such an epidemic outbreak in this China which has seemed to escape Covid so far. The Omicron variant, very contagious as we know, ended up penetrating on Chinese soil. And it attacks the elderly, who are poorly vaccinated in China. This is the first explanation: only 50% of people over 80 have received two doses, and in Hong Kong, it is even less, 25%. Mistrust of vaccines is high, especially among older people who adhere to traditional Chinese medicine. In addition, Chinese vaccines are less effective, especially against Omicron. Western vaccines, the Pfizer BioNtech for example, are not used in mainland China.
Second explanation: an illusion of security has been installed for two years in the country, given the low number of victims. So vigilance has dropped. Sanitary infrastructure has not been particularly developed. And the Chinese power persists in its zero Covid strategy: there is no question of abandoning strict confinements, which have allowed it to increase its social control over the population.
But this wave of contamination can have a serious impact on the economy. In Hong Kong, it’s obvious: many foreign companies, multinationals, large banks, have already packed up. In Shanghai, the fear of a general confinement has created nervousness since Tuesday March 22. Residents began rushing to stock up or increasing door-to-door food deliveries. And of course, there are also the few completely shut down regions.
All of this is starting to make the growth target set by the government this year unattainable: +5.5%. Especially if we add the multiple economic repercussions of the war in Ukraine. This is not good news for President Xi Jinping, a few months from the Party Congress, scheduled for next fall.