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Supposing there were a new variant, or some new illness entirely, recent history suggests the CCP would sooner try to suppress it themselves than admit it publi

Supposing there were a new variant, or some new illness entirely, recent history suggests the CCP would sooner try to suppress it themselves than admit it publicly. So... maybe.

GekkePrutser 5y ago
Don't forget that China still tries for a zero covid strategy even with variants that are unlikely to overload the health system like Omicron. So whether it's Omicron or a new variant, their response would be the same. Sooner or later they'll have to open up like we did (and things are going just fine). But I think it's a PR issue, they've been preaching the zero covid so long.. They care a lot about their reputation.
- blablablub 5y ago
  The current omicron cases are already overloading the health system in Shanghai. and that are only about 5000 cases.
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    But that could be a response issue too.. As far as I've heard China hospitalizes everyone even cases that don't need actual care. Also they have some immunity to build up that we have had over the last 2 years. I know it doesn't prevent covid but it does seem to reduce it's severity a lot.
    - jseban 5y ago
      > As far as I've heard China hospitalizes everyone even cases that don't need actual care. That's what I heard too, so it's a catch-22. Similar issues in Sweden in the beginning of the year when they introduced the rule that the whole household has to quarantine if only one person tests positive, suddenly the whole country was on sick leave, including the hospital staff, so they also did a DDoS on their own health care system.
    - blablablub 5y ago
      China distinguishes between asymptomatic and "confirmed" cases. In the last 10 days there were around 140k asymptomatic cases - those are shipped to the makeshift hospitals "quarantine centers" you see on TV. During the same time there are around 5k cases with symptoms, as i understand all confirmed with a chest x-ray scan(?). Those go into the covid hospitals, which are now overflowing. Do all of those need to go to a hospital? I don't know. But on the pictures you see mostly elderly people, and the vaccination rate among those is about as high as in HK
      - rdtwo 5y ago
        Considering how many people were tested a bunch of those could just be false positives. They did like 100m tests or something crazy
        blablablub 5y ago
        No they didn't. Shanghai's testing capacity is around 2m/day.
        rdtwo 5y ago
        I thought they tested everyone in the city like 4 times.
  - robonerd 5y ago
    Starving people in their apartment buildings to prevent a collapse of the hospital system? The solution is worse than the problem. I'd rather be free in a city with no hospitals at all, than be imprisoned and starved in my own home for my 'protection.'
  - rdtwo 5y ago
    Is it? Or all all the false positives from over testing creating a huge problem?
    - drno123 5y ago
      If you have a test with 0.1% false positive rate, and you test 25Mil people on a weekly basis, every week you get 25.000 false positives, or, as they say, “asymptomatic cases”.
- RandomWorker 5y ago
  Happy valley from Monty Python https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=q_4Ny8aLTS0 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=q_4Ny8aLTS0
  - mlindner 5y ago
    I haven't heard this one before, but the relevance is amazing. Thank you.
- freyr 5y ago
  It’s been reported that Omicron was relatively mild in the West because so many people are vaccinated or have had previous exposure. In a place like Hong Kong, where relatively few people were vaccinated or previously infected, Omicron was much deadlier. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/04/09/asias-outbreaks-show-that-omicron-is-deadly-in-unvaccinated-people https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/04/09/asias-ou...
  - _abox 5y ago
    Which reinforces the idea that the decision to let it spread here was a good one I think. We have more than enough vaccines and it looks like the exposure helps too. China's policy may work against them if that's the case.
- jhanschoo 5y ago
  A nuance is that mainland vaccination (incl. up to booster) with the new-technology vaccines hasn't been as robust as without the mainland. I don't know if the conventional technologies that China is using for its domestic vaccines are also worse at controlling COVID symptoms (alongside being far less effective), but if that's the case Omicron poses a very real threat to China that other countries don't face.

Supposing there were a new variant, or some new illness entirely, recent history suggests the CCP would sooner try to suppress it themselves than admit it publicly. So... maybe.

GekkePrutser 5y ago

Don't forget that China still tries for a zero covid strategy even with variants that are unlikely to overload the health system like Omicron. So whether it's Omicron or a new variant, their response would be the same. Sooner or later they'll have to open up like we did (and things are going just fine). But I think it's a PR issue, they've been preaching the zero covid so long.. They care a lot about their reputation.

blablablub 5y ago
The current omicron cases are already overloading the health system in Shanghai. and that are only about 5000 cases.
- GekkePrutser 5y ago
  But that could be a response issue too.. As far as I've heard China hospitalizes everyone even cases that don't need actual care. Also they have some immunity to build up that we have had over the last 2 years. I know it doesn't prevent covid but it does seem to reduce it's severity a lot.
  - jseban 5y ago
    > As far as I've heard China hospitalizes everyone even cases that don't need actual care. That's what I heard too, so it's a catch-22. Similar issues in Sweden in the beginning of the year when they introduced the rule that the whole household has to quarantine if only one person tests positive, suddenly the whole country was on sick leave, including the hospital staff, so they also did a DDoS on their own health care system.
  - blablablub 5y ago
    China distinguishes between asymptomatic and "confirmed" cases. In the last 10 days there were around 140k asymptomatic cases - those are shipped to the makeshift hospitals "quarantine centers" you see on TV. During the same time there are around 5k cases with symptoms, as i understand all confirmed with a chest x-ray scan(?). Those go into the covid hospitals, which are now overflowing. Do all of those need to go to a hospital? I don't know. But on the pictures you see mostly elderly people, and the vaccination rate among those is about as high as in HK
    - rdtwo 5y ago
      Considering how many people were tested a bunch of those could just be false positives. They did like 100m tests or something crazy
      - blablablub 5y ago
        No they didn't. Shanghai's testing capacity is around 2m/day.
        rdtwo 5y ago
        I thought they tested everyone in the city like 4 times.
- robonerd 5y ago
  Starving people in their apartment buildings to prevent a collapse of the hospital system? The solution is worse than the problem. I'd rather be free in a city with no hospitals at all, than be imprisoned and starved in my own home for my 'protection.'
- rdtwo 5y ago
  Is it? Or all all the false positives from over testing creating a huge problem?
  - drno123 5y ago
    If you have a test with 0.1% false positive rate, and you test 25Mil people on a weekly basis, every week you get 25.000 false positives, or, as they say, “asymptomatic cases”.
RandomWorker 5y ago
Happy valley from Monty Python https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=q_4Ny8aLTS0 https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=q_4Ny8aLTS0
- mlindner 5y ago
  I haven't heard this one before, but the relevance is amazing. Thank you.
freyr 5y ago
It’s been reported that Omicron was relatively mild in the West because so many people are vaccinated or have had previous exposure. In a place like Hong Kong, where relatively few people were vaccinated or previously infected, Omicron was much deadlier. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/04/09/asias-outbreaks-show-that-omicron-is-deadly-in-unvaccinated-people https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/04/09/asias-ou...
- _abox 5y ago
  Which reinforces the idea that the decision to let it spread here was a good one I think. We have more than enough vaccines and it looks like the exposure helps too. China's policy may work against them if that's the case.
jhanschoo 5y ago
A nuance is that mainland vaccination (incl. up to booster) with the new-technology vaccines hasn't been as robust as without the mainland. I don't know if the conventional technologies that China is using for its domestic vaccines are also worse at controlling COVID symptoms (alongside being far less effective), but if that's the case Omicron poses a very real threat to China that other countries don't face.