What China ’s Zero-COVID Policy Means for the Pandemic—in China and the Rest of the World

Protests in multiple Chinese cities over the strict COVID-19 policies enforced by China’s government reflect the growing sentiment of people around the world. We’re tired of the pandemic, and tired of the myriad ways the SARS-CoV-2 virus has changed our lives forever. But the demonstrations in China also reflect a more specific, local frustration with a strategy for controlling the virus that every other country in the world has long since left behind. China’s zero-COVID strategy is an extension of the drastic measures instituted, not only in that country but in others around the world, including the U.S., during the early days of the pandemic in an effort to quash the virus as quickly as possible. That made sense at the beginning when people had no immunity to the virus, and there were no vaccines or treatments to fight it. In fact, instituting lockdowns and keeping people from mingling are among the public health pillars of controlling an infectious disease. “Employing quarantine, isolation, and testing are all core public health strategies that we use in all sorts of outbreaks,” says Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. “And they remain viable. But they don’t always infringe on basic freedoms and rights in the same way we have seen in China. Clearly in this instance, they have become very extensive.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] China’s strategy has been to test ...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized COVID-19 Source Type: news