Image: Sebastiaan Stam
At lunch recently, a friend raised the question of why China would persist on a zero-Covid policy when the science and reality are refuting a possible attainment, and rest of the world is adjusting to living with the virus. After more than two years of battling uncertainties, rounds of viral mutations, and waves of outbreaks, the virus is here to stay.
It’s tricky to explain with certainty of China’s adamant stance, but face would be a predominating factor. The country was one of the first few to claim success in containing the virus during the early days of the pandemic with its “dynamic zero-Covid” policy that uses mass testing and strict lockdowns to fight outbreaks. In fact, officials have hailed the policy superior to the approach taken by the democratic West, using the two approaches to compare the Chinese governance and system against that of the US and Europe.
However, as the world soon found out, the pattern of the pandemic has been a series of Covid-19 waves of differing variants: surges in new cases followed by declines, which makes China’s war to eliminate one of Mother Nature’s most contagious viruses an elusive act. Worse still, the lightning speed in which the Omicron variant spreads is exposing the problems of a zero policy not just to the world, but more damagingly, to its own people.
This year is a crucial one as a five-yearly party congress will convene in the autumn when the chief would launch a third term and a pathway to lifelong rule. Domestic stability and success are important building blocks to claims of infallibility and hence the leadership’s legitimacy.
For a gauge of the zero policy’s viability, look at the semi-autonomous city of Hong Kong which has — until Beijing’s tightened control following the anti-democracy protests in 2019 — thrived on Western values and systems. Hong Kong has had an enviable record containing the coronavirus up to the beginning of 2022 when Omicron infections surged, from recording one of the world’s lowest Covid-19 death rates to one of the worst. The dynamic zero-Covid of mass testing and strictest restrictions triggered chaos and sent the city’s healthcare system into overrun. A shocking photograph taken in a hospital ward where filled body bags on stretchers piled up next to Covid-19 patients went viral.
In a pandemic, free flow of information and transparency count, and it can sway public trust in the government. But the evolving political landscape and erosion of civil liberties have elevated citizens’ distrust of the Hong Kong government to new heights. And that was evident in the low vaccination rate throughout 2021 despite the absence of any anti-vax movement and an ample supply of vaccines including the mRNA vaccines made in the West, unlike in the mainland where only Chinese Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccinese are approved.
As Hong Kong emerged from the lockdown last week, it remains caught between a rock and a hard place. Various border controls and quarantine requirements continue to hurt an economy that relies on international finance and trade when other countries and regions are reopening. Mainland China, on the other hand, with a vast domestic market is pivoting inwards – domestic cycle of production, distribution, and consumption – to recast growth. There is no visible sign that Beijing will change course from the zero-Covid policy as officials have tied that to the party’s governing legitimacy. At least not anytime soon. Afterall, face runs deep.
