Xi Jinping, the president of China, began his second decade in office with a promise to bring the country back to its former glory, so 2022 was meant to be a triumphant year for the country and its leader.
Instead, China experienced its most challenging year under Xi’s leadership as a result of his expensive zero-Covid policy. Months of overzealous enforcement that destroyed the economy and stoked historic public unrest were followed by an abrupt abandonment of the policy in its entirety that left a fragile health system scrambling to handle an increase in cases.
The disorder and confusion stand in stark contrast to Beijing’s early-year demonstration of the effectiveness of its Covid containment efforts by successfully containing the coronavirus from the Winter Olympics.
Over the course of a year, Xi’s signature pandemic strategy has transformed from a source of legitimacy for the ruling Communist Party into a catastrophe that threatens to destabilise it.
Many have questioned why, after making such great sacrifices under zero-Covid and waited so long to reopen, the government ultimately allowed the virus to ravage a populace with little advance notice or preparation as an unprecedented wave of illnesses – and fatalities – sweeps the nation.
AWN takes a look back at the five most significant events for China’s zero-Covid policy in 2022 as the year comes to a close.
Winter Olympics in Beijing
China’s zero-Covid approach was a spectacular success at the Games.
The ubiquitous face masks, constant disinfection spraying, and stringent daily testing paid off in the tightly contained, immaculately maintained Olympic bubble. The Winter Olympics were mostly free of Covid even while the Omicron variety raged over the world because any infected tourists arriving in the country were quickly recognised and their cases were confined.
The achievement strengthened the party’s argument that its political system is better equipped to handle the pandemic than those of Western democracies, a point Xi had regularly emphasised as he campaigned for a third term in office.
Additionally, it gave China more assurance that its well-honed zero-Covid playbook of lockdowns, quarantines, mass testing, and contact tracing could create a strong defence against the highly contagious Omicron virus and stop its spread. These actions helped contain the nation’s first Omicron epidemic in Tianjin, a port city close to Beijing, in January as the Games approached.
Beijing lockdown
However, Omicron quickly managed to slip through zero-pores. Covid’s By the middle of March, China was dealing with its worst Covid outbreak since the pandemic’s first wave, with thousands of new cases being reported every day from Guangdong in the south to Jilin province in the north.
Shanghai’s financial core quickly developed into the focal point. Local authorities first disagreed that a citywide lockdown was required, but after the city reported 3,500 daily infections, they imposed one.
The two-month lockup was transformed into a stark representation of the financial and social repercussions of zero-Covid. The richest and sexiest metropolis in the nation had significant food shortages, a dearth of emergency medical care, sparse improvised isolation facilities, and mandatory house cleaning. Wave after wave of protest was sparked by the harsh measures, significantly undermining popular confidence in the Shanghai government.
The economy was severely damaged by the lockdown as well. In the three months that ended in June, China’s GDP shrank by 2.6%, and the rate of youth unemployment rose to a record-high of almost 20%.
However, the expensive shutdown failed to persuade China to change its zero-tolerance policy. Instead, it was celebrated by officials as a win in the conflict with Covid. Other municipal governments learned from this experience that they had to stop illnesses as soon as possible before epidemics got out of hand.
The majority of the nation’s Covid infections are no longer reported by the government, and it has lowered the standards for recording Covid deaths, which the World Health Organization has warned will “significantly underestimate the true mortality toll.”
Although the public’s fear was taken into account when making that decision, the political overtones are clearly obvious.
China’s low Covid caseload and death rate compared to nations like the United States had been used for almost three years as a barometer of the party’s success and legitimacy.
Now that the actual scope of the outbreak and mortality is known, it may be difficult for the government to maintain its credibility after justifying years of onerous restrictions on the basis that they were required to preserve lives.
According to some analyses, China’s unplanned and hasty reopening could result in up to a million deaths, which would be comparable to the US’s Covid death toll.
Zero-Covid has finally passed away as China approaches its third and harshest epidemic winter, but the consequences of its death will continue to plague the nation into the following year.