To think China is still locking down

[mumofgirl1]

Sorry if this has already be posted about I was just watching the local news and they where covering recent lockdowns in China I'm shocked they are still implementing lockdowns and wondered how there economy is coping nearly 3yrs down the line of lockdowns and what has happened to the vaccines over there have they not worked. It seems so strange when the rest of the world are coming out the other side of this and they are still putting local lockdowns in place surely they can't do this forever

This is what some either don't see or refuse to see. As I said there isn't a chance in hell of the UK locking down again after what Boris Johnson pulled. But my hospital appointment I've waited over 2 years has just been put back for the 3rd time due to 'Staff Illness'. That's Code for 'it's Covid really but we don't like to admit it's still affecting things even without lockdowns and restrictions'.

The vaccine doesn't stop transmission.

When there's many private schools with hepa filters known to dramatically reduce covid cases and keep kids in school and yet they were deemed too expensive to put in state schools where children don't have the luxury to still isolate without the risk of an absence fine; and when there's TV Studios still operating with covid control measures (does no one ever question why all these day time TV shows like loose women and Jeremy Vine show still sit socially distanced on the panels?) It shows me that there are ways to minimise unmitigated Covid infections and the impact on the workforce but only those who can afford to can benefit from doing so.

OTOH there are TV programmes like Strictly where they are all close together and hugging and one confirmed case of covid doesn't seem to have spread like wildfire through the cast...

Some industries like film take extra precautions because of the costs involved. I was an extra on a "blockbuster" style movie filming in Glasgow back in March 2022 and we had huge levels of testing and precautions, much much more than in society as a whole. Every day before I was allowed on set we had to take both a PCR and LFT test, the high-grade FTP whatever it is masks had to be worn at all times when not filming, social distancing, sanitising, they had special covid marshalls to enforce the rules. We had to upload proof that we'd had all recommended vaccines before we were even considered for work.

This wasn't because they were terrified of covid, it was because there was so much money involved in making the movie and limited time for filming. Had one of the key stunt people, or directors, gone down with covid, it could have led to the movie not being finished. So they obviously decided to take every precaution going in order to reduce that risk as much as they could.

So I do kind of get it in industries where there is that sort of money at stake.

A good Twitter account coming out of China on what's happening.
There's one a little way down by a woman who described the scary levels of surveillance that enable it.

twitter.com/songpinganq?t=x0iBFjuSB-WVh5La2ZBGgg&s=09

a) achieving high enough vaccine cover is difficult
b) the vaccine wears off - all of them do
c) even with vaccine cover, people can still become unpleasantly ill , with knock on effects to society and the economy
d) long covid is taking a toll, and we still don’t fully understand it
e) we don’t know if the virus lodges in the body long term, or what it could do if it reactivated - maybe a covid shingles? (Or worse AIDS)
f) covid dampens immune response generally for a few months (at least) after infection regardless of mildness of initial illness - may perhaps have a role in all the other infectious diseases that we are being warned are in high (and sometimes severe) circulation this winter
g) definite role in increase in strokes and sudden adult death

worst case is that in 5 or 10 years time, the Chinese population - who are ‘living with it’ by having normality except when there’s an outbreak, this meaning most people never get it - are generally in similar good health to the population before 2019. Whilst countries who ‘live with it’ by ignoring it are building a ticking time bomb of long term detrimental effects (whist simultaneously making things like cancer care or anything else which can wipe immune system)

It wouldn’t play well. Imagine leaked video of force vaccinating elderly people shared across social media, it’s too far even for the CCP. There is a real mistrust of Western medicine among older folks …

A detailed thread on Chinese surveillance

"Example, when Wuhan residents in early 2020 went online to say that relatives were falling ill from a disease the govt had so far denied was contageous, some told me they were visited within hrs by police. In one case, police came to the hospital to order a family to remove posts"

"“But after all that, at least people will remember my protest” – not likely, a search on Weibo (China’s Twitter) today shows nothing is happening at all. Why? Each company has 1000s of censors. I wrote about one of these incredible censorship factories:"

twitter.com/catecadell/status/1597647634960818176?t=jaoU2M4vXbfQdo0EmuEd8g&s=19

My friend has recently moved from
Shanghai to Thailand. She wanted to get away. She said they’re locking down offices, so people go to work and then can’t leave. Same for schools, they’re told to take bags of stuff incase they can’t leave for a week once they’re there! Separating kids from parents etc. it’s awful.

My brother is out there. Still locked down. Allowed out once a day for a daily test. Food is delivered to the compound. Its horrific

That's bad

My brother is in Kunming I hope it's better there. Still worry though

@shasha21 if you can get a visa for studying how come my friends son is currently in Singapore studying online in approx the right time zone instead of taking his place at Beijing University?

It doesn't spread in tv studios at the rate it does in schools etc because they have covid control measures in place still and stars and staff and audience who are testing positive are still required to isolate. A friend has visited several TV studios over the last year most recently only last month to a BBC one and got a whole list of TS&Cs on C19 measures including the stipulation that they would not be permitted entrance if they were covid positive. Is Kym Marsh the one case you were talking about or is this the second one? www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2022/nov/22/kym-marsh-miss-strictly-come-dancing-covid-bbc

People still defending China. This is quite scary, really.
They believe the number of deaths and don't take a minute to think about any none covid deaths or the trails of being fastened in to your home or feeling like you or your loved ones could be snatched from it in a heartbeat.

Perhaps I'm looking at it wrong but I don't see that twitter post as necessarily defending China. He's pointing out that our own current failed herd immunity experiment isn't going too well either. Aren't both causing harm?

I can't see how it could possibly be read as anything other than defence of China.

He's ackowledging that their policy 'has problems' by which I presume he's referring to things like people burning to death because they've been welded into quarantine, but claims it has saved an enormous number of lives. How isn't that justifying it? It's a piss poor attempt at justification, obviously, because the figures provided by the Chinese state mean absolutely nothing and also because he's completely failed to consider what happens next, but he clearly thinks that their way has led to fewer deaths thus far and that this is something in its favour.

It also appears to be what he's attempting with his attempt at an unfavourable comparison with the UK, as though there's a rule that one of the approaches must have been correct and this is binary. And lastly, there's a clear attempt to delegitimise criticism of a regime for a little thing like causing people to burn alive in forced quarantine by calling it 'bashing'.

It's not justifying it is it? I just don't think a country that has sent thousands of people to their deaths by ignoring covid has the right to decide what they deem as where the bar of decency in public health is.
China's policy is tyrannical. But so was sending positive covid patients back to carehomes. They couldn't escape risk either.

Yes, it's absolutely justifying. That's what the claim it has saved lives is in there for.

What you are saying here is that you don't think some other people or perhaps institutions, it isn't quite clear, have any room to criticise. Which is not the same issue at all, albeit the tweet does attempt to conflate them.

So how could the carehome residents sent back to their deaths have avoided risks?

How is that relevant to the issue of whether the tweet was an attempt at justifying the Chinese state's actions? You agreeing with the tweet has zero bearing on that.

I see the link you are trying to make, @LizTrusssPA . You're saying it's hypocritical. Fair point, I suppose, although the Chinese government are more brutal by far. We just starve our population these days!

Thankyou.

I didn't agree with the tweet. I said both approaches to covid whether China's or the UKs are causing harm.

You also said that the tweet wasn't justifying or defending China's behaviour, which is the part we were discussing. So your question about care homes has no bearing at all on that.