China is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 cases.
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China is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 infections that risks straining its healthcare system.
Beijing reversed its pandemic containment measures a week ago.
China reported 8,838 new COVID-19 infections — including asymptomatic cases — for Sunday.
Less than a week after reversing its pandemic containment measures, China is experiencing a surge in COVID-19 infections that risks straining the country’s healthcare system.
Medical workers at a large hospital in downtown Beijing have been ordered back to work from their vacations, while those at least one other hospital have been asked to continue working even if they’ve been infected with mild cases of COVID-19, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing unnamed healthcare staff.
China reported 8,838 new COVID-19 infections — including asymptomatic cases — for Sunday, according to the country’s National Health Commission — down from 10,815 on Sunday. The decline in recorded cases came after China ended mandatory mass testing a week ago, but anecdotal evidence suggests much larger numbers.
“On the ground, media reports and anecdotal evidence point to a scarcity of fever medicine as residents rush to stock up on essential drugs,” analysts at Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy, wrote on Friday. “Residents in Beijing are lining up for hours to access fever clinics following the new relaxation measures. Such strains will likely extend beyond hospitals to affect community clinics and health workers as the government shifts the burden to grassroots medical institutions as the ‘gatekeepers’ and first responders to rising infections.”
State media is calling on people not to call the emergency medical hotline in Beijing unless they are seriously ill because it could hold up the calls of those who really need help, per Bloomberg.
It could get worse as the country heads into the Chinese New Year travel season, which is set to start in January.
“An anticipated movement surge in the coming weeks, coupled with a shortfall in elderly immunization at least in the near term, will risk a spike in infections throughout China and potentially severe strains on the public health system and already short-staffed community-level clinics,” the Eurasia Group analysts wrote.
To deal with an anticipated surge, China’s cabinet called for the “full mobilization” of hospitals in a meeting on Thursday, including bolstering staff numbers and boosting supplies of medication, according to an official transcript.
Despite the crunch, China is unlikely to turn back on the reversal of its COVID policy.
“Relaxing Covid-19 controls will lead to greater outbreaks, but Beijing is unlikely to return to the extended blanket lockdowns that crashed the economy earlier this year,” the Eurasia analysts wrote.