The New Era Now: A Reflection on Current Pandemic Control Efforts in Shanghai
When future historians look back on the past three years, the description most will to use to describe this period is the start of a "new era." To be sure, this term was already current in China years before, describing both national and international trends that were clear to policymakers in Beijing. But since the Trump presidency, the US-instigated trade war, the floundering global effort to respond effectively to climate change, the pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine, it's increasingly clear to observers worldwide that many ruptures with the past are emerging and intersecting. It's also clear that China is coming out on top.
No other country appears to have foreseen these challenges, discussed them candidly, prepared for them and responded as well as China has. On the one hand, we can see this most clearly with China's incredible responses to COVID-19, the way it has consistently put people first, put people over profits, and minimized loss of life. On the other hand, this was only possible because China has been building capacity and achieving results for decades, moving steadily from one challenge to the next, emerging stronger with each encounter.
Last year's celebrations of having achieved the xiaokang society goal, of having raised hundreds of millions out of poverty and eliminating extreme poverty altogether were rightfully taken as evidence that one era had reached its objective while a new one was coming into view. These facts were compelling enough. But what made these developments even more compelling is that they took place in the midst of a global pandemic. While most of the rest of the world floundered and fell apart, with heartbreaking morbidity and mortality rates and serious social, political and economic instabilities, China took control of itself, suppressed the disease, protected its people, and produced many of the vital goods needed by others around the world as their production capacities stumbled.
It's hard to imagine any of this would have been possible if China had not advanced the overwhelming objective of improving governance. This has been the focal of President Xi Jinping and the fifth generation of leadership since 2012, and the results speak for themselves. Not only were development goals achieved on schedule, but likely millions of lives were saved. How many millions were saved? We cannot be sure. Estimates range from 6 to 12 million in China alone, but likely include many more around the world: recall, China provided millions of vaccines to UN peacekeepers and developing countries, including those ignored by Western countries and pharmaceutical firms. But it also helped save others by suppressing the virus at home, undoubtedly preventing the emergence of more mutations that would have increased mortality worldwide.
And in the middle of all of this it hosted the Winter Olympics in Beijing. Despite the Cold War tactics of the US to malign the games with a diplomatic boycott, the games and the Paralympics that followed were hugely successful, providing the world with exactly what it needed as it struggled to recover: a showcasing of the power of the human spirit to overcome adversity and reach new heights, and to do so through peaceful competition and cooperation. But all of this was possible because China had done such a good job of controlling the virus before the games began, and further, because it provided the athletes and world a master class in control through its closed loop system while the games were underway.
By some estimates the world is now adjusting to a new normal with COVID-19, and this is true in China as well. It's one of the typical evolutions of a virus to mutate in ways that make it more infectious but less deadly, with those mutations becoming dominant. This appears to be true in terms of what we are seeing now. While many countries have endured tremendous losses and are welcoming these developments by relaxing the minimally effective controls they once had in place, China is still fighting the disease, keeping firm border controls, maintaining quarantines for new arrivals, isolating suspected cases, restricting travel, and locking downs and affected communities. This is why China is continuing to mass test, contact trace and develop and implement the necessary health and public health infrastructure to protect lives.
All of these policies are being guided by science. It's true for example, that the OMICRON strains are less deadly than their predecessors, but because they are more infectious they still kill a lot of people. And who do they kill in particular? In fact, while they have killed people across all age, ethnic and class groups around the world, who they kill the most are the elderly, those who are already suffering from poor health, and those who are economically disadvantaged. This brings us to one of the most damning and persistent criticisms of ineffectual responses to the pandemic in the rest of the world, including the United States and Europe–that their lack of controls condemned many of their most vulnerable citizens to death. This is inconsistent with a genuine commitment to human rights. It is antithetical to socialism.
China is sticking with it dynamic covid clearance policies because the vulnerable are still at risk. This was confirmed by the recent outbreaks in Hong Kong, when deaths peaked at 300 per day, and that remain near 200 per day. If a comparable outbreak occurred in Shenzhen or Shanghai and was uncontrolled, then the numbers would be much higher, and could quickly surpass the total number of deaths China has registered since the outbreak began. So let's be clear, this policy is still saving lives, thousands if not tens of thousands. In short, this is what real socialism and human rights look like.
Throughout the pandemic Shanghai has been one of the best examples of containment and control. Now, the struggle has come to Shanghai, and it's a difficult fight. One of the world's largest and densest cities, an outbreak of OMICRON is both difficult and necessary to control. Many will question whether this is still necessary, whether the costs of control exceed the benefits, and many wonder how long this will be necessary.
Because controls in Shanghai have been so good, some have come to take them for granted. And now that OMICRON is here we see a system working to its limit trying to hold the line and push back against the disease. We hear some who are questioning the value of vaccines, questioning the capacity of local governance, and even losing faith that a new era is here, with the most persistent criticism being that China is stuck in its own closed loop.
The frustration is understandable and so is the fatigue, but the criticisms are unfair. To be sure, people are bullied in part by viral misinformation and their own ignorance. The government has tried to correct both problems but it's hard to protect people and educate them thoroughly in such a hyper-digital environment. But let's consider the issue of vaccines, for example: many mistakenly believe that vaccines work by preventing infection. They ask, if we have good vaccination rates, then why do we have infections, or why should we worry about the disease spreading? In fact, vaccines don't prevent infections, rather, they prepare the body to respond to infections. In terms of big numbers, Chinese vaccines work rather well, as we've seen from data in other countries that used them but also lost control of the virus. But they don't protect everyone, not everyone will get them, and they are only one tool of control. Indeed, China's remarkable success at containment is not due primarily to vaccines, but to other measures, like masking, testing, quarantines, lockdowns, closed loops and so on. Hence, these controls remain, because the desire to put people first, to protect the vulnerable, also remains.
Despite the current difficulties, there are many reasons to be optimistic. To be sure, the first is that morbidity and mortality rates in China are still very low compared to other countries. But the second is the likelihood that China is rapidly approaching a new normal in its pandemic control efforts. We have already seen policy adjustments reflecting these developments in recent weeks, in terms of how asymptomatic cases are handled, how quickly the infected are allowed to return home, and so on. But we are also seeing other developments that eventually will help ease restrictions. These include approving and stockpiling highly effective, world class drugs, getting the country to warmer months, and hopefully, seeing the pandemic subside globally.
This is to say that we might be nearing the finish line; but as we all know, you don't win the race by slowing down or giving up near the end. Rather, that's when you try harder, you push yourself, you fight through the pain and fatigue and come through stronger. Of course, some might ask, with whom is China racing? And the answer, as the new era has made clear in so many ways – China is racing itself. We have seen such marvelous and even unprecedented historical achievements in China, including containing and recovering from the pandemic, and doing so against a multitude of naysayers, against historical precedence of it never being done, that it couldn't be done. This is to say that China isn't following others, isn't limiting itself to what others achieved in the past. It isn't sitting still and trying to hold position in some imaginary "end of history."
Instead, this is what the new era is really about: setting new standards for China and showing itself and the rest of the world a better way forward. This is why people in China and overseas should welcome the ongoing controls, place faith in a government that has outperformed all others, and prepare themselves emotionally and physically for new challenges to come. Despite the current difficulties, they should be confident they're better off than most around the world, both now and likely in the future.
Josef Gregory Mahoney is Professor of Politics and International Relations at East China Normal University and Senior Research Fellow with the Institute for the Development of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics at Southeast University.
