Cole Gaynor
// The U.S. lives with COVID; China stamps it out completely //
Fewer than 50 people have died from COVID-19 in China since September 13th, 2021. The official recorded COVID-19 death count in China is 4,849, and it has remained at nearly exactly that number for months. In that same time span, the total cases of the virus jumped by a bit over 11,000 cases, for a total pandemic count of just under 120,000. To someone living through the United States’ surge of infections, who just witnessed the United States report 1,000,000 new cases in a single day, this number may seem inconceivable. The United States has been struggling to adjust to remote work and education for almost two years. After countless setbacks and a total of 862,000 deaths to date, it is hard to believe that these two countries faced the same virus. The United States’ philosophy of managing an endemic virus, rather than trying to eradicate it, has had disastrous consequences compared to China’s overly-criticized zero-COVID policy.
From the pandemic’s outset, China took highly restrictive measures to contain its cases. However, even after seeing the societal impact of COVID-19, and in the midst of a still-increasing death toll, headlines still decry the great cost of China’s response: “IMF warns China over cost of Covid lockdowns,” “Xi’an: The messy cost of China’s Covid lockdown playbook,” “China’s ‘Zero Covid’ Efforts Come With A Cost.” Media coverage of the issue in the United States and Europe takes a negative slant on China’s efforts to keep cases as close to zero as possible. However, an examination of the exact costs of this method reveal that the trade-offs are much more reasonable than media coverage suggests.
On the surface, the economic costs of lockdowns and restrictions on movement are immediately evident. Even with the expansion of remote work for non-manual jobs, lockdowns bring a huge portion of the economy to a halt. Retail stores, restaurants, construction, and other businesses simply cannot succeed in a remote world. With such a dearth of economic activity, critics of zero-COVID lockdowns rightly cite the losses to GDP growth and employment security. By economic metrics, however, China has fared better than the countries that attempted to live with COVID-19: China saw an astronomical GDP growth of over 10 percent in the past two years, dwarfing both the 3 percent average of other “emerging market economies” and the GDP decrease that advanced economies experienced during the pandemic, according to the IMF. Although lockdowns result in a short-term economic cost, the continuation of COVID-19 has had a greater impact in the long term than initial, harsh controllment measures. Deaths, hospitalizations, and sickness all produce economic burdens. As China demonstrates, the economic damages a lockdown induces are offset by the ability to get back on track with business in an overwhelmingly COVID-free society.
Many assert that lockdowns also come at high costs to individuals. With widespread lockdowns, China seemingly treads heavily on the idea of personal freedom of movement. From a moral and political standpoint, lockdowns sacrifice an element of personal choice. In a unilateral decision to enforce strict measures, some may insist the Chinese government fails in this paramount aim of government. However, even from an American perspective, this line of thought sounds radically individualistic, and the tolerance of China’s citizens to endure the inconveniences of a lockdown render the threat to personal liberty perfectly palatable. According to BBC interviews, a Western source unlikely to have a pro-China bias, Chinese citizens opposed lifting lockdowns, saying that “it would be best to wait until the pandemic is sorted out properly because safety is number one” and “for the sake of social stability, it would be best to hold off opening up.” The willingness of Chinese citizens to accept harsher safety regulations indicates a minimal perceived social cost from lockdowns.
Admittedly, there are legitimate obstacles to enforcing widespread lockdown measures in the Western world without abridging personal liberties, given widespread lockdown opposition. In some places like the United States and Europe, achieving zero-COVID might become more difficult on account of a weaker social coherency or less social value attributed to public health. However, to criticise China’s response on the basis of an American concern is to ascribe to China a problem that does not exist. China does not have the same historic individualism as the United States, and judging its response without that fact in mind is unfair. If a pandemic response represents a balancing act between disease prevention, economic crisis aversion, and popular support, China has effectively achieved all three of this trinity.
The United States has created a society and economy without brakes. We, as a country, do not have the ability to stop for a month or for a second to catch our breath–or to contain a pandemic. Our unending pursuit of economic growth and the economic catastrophe that results from any break in production has led to the endemicization and normalization of COVID-19 in the United States. Unless we remain willing to cope with incredible fatalities, we need to stop orienting our society around infinite growth. In an increasingly interconnected, globalized world, we cannot handle the pandemic with a lackluster rigor. Pausing our lives is necessary to save lives.
Despite its draconian COVID-19 containment measures, China’s economy experienced significantly greater growth than advanced and emerging economies.
China’s lockdown was far more severe than those in the U.S.
https://time.com/5796425/china-coronavirus-lockdown/
China’s made an incredible economic comeback as it effectively responded to COVID-19 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-economy-gdp-idINKBN27404Z
While China quickly flattened its curve, the U.S.’s grew exponentially.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/31/opinion/coronavirus-cases-united-states.html
