Why is China not seeing an increase in cases?

[ProseccoSupernova]

Or are they not just recording it?

@ShanghaiDiva I understood what you said but I still would never say I am glad to not live in a democracy. Virus or no virus. That is scary.

That's a really interesting blog @stillgoings and mirrors our experiences. We are also in Shanghai and life really is very normal now. We need to wear masks on the metro and in Didis (Ubers) but bars/restaurants/cafes are all normal.

They did clamp down far harder on the virus than a liberal democracy could have done and this has helped eradicate it (fron what I see around me). We came back to Shanghai in March and after a few days in a testing centre were taped into our very small apartment (110m2 for 2 adults and 2 children) for 11days. We also had an electronic tag on our door. Luckily we tested negative when we landed - if your child test results are positive they are removed from you and placed in a hospital - where you can not visit them - until they test negative.

We are hoping to return to the UK next summer, although as my daughter is now 14, if our new compound/landlord don't allow us to quarantine there (they can decline you) she will spend 2 weeks in a hotel room on her own.

People are also more generally more obedient here and will wear masks if asked and just accept it as so and they realise that it is their responsibility towards others to do so. I've not seen anyone on the metro not wearing one despite plenty of opportunities to take them off.

@Lollipity people are more obedient in China because it is a dictatorship and they disappear if they don’t obey! Sorry but all this scares me. If your child tests positive they are removed from you? You were taped into a small apartment. I can totally understand this if the virus was more deadly than it is but this virus is certainly not deadly enough to warrant this.

Sorry but how can you both defend this? An electronic tag on your door? For a virus like this?

It's the same in Oz, WA at least, closed border and strict quarantine. My bil can and sil had pics up the weekend of them partying!!

I don’t trust anything official that comes out of China. Look how they covered it up in the first place. It’s in their interests to make other countries think they are managing it well.

People are also more generally more obedient here and will wear masks if asked and just accept it as so and they realise that it is their responsibility towards others to do so. I've not seen anyone on the metro not wearing one despite plenty of opportunities to take them off.

People are more obedient under a totalitarian government where citizens were barricaded into their homes and kids forcibly removed from them. No shit!

Also we now know it was around earlier than China said.

I'm.not sure they are defending it @Bool. Aren't they just answering the question - why are China not seeing an increase in cases? This is how they have done it.

I am just answering the question as to why the cases are lower: tough action taken promptly.
People may not believe the figures, but my dh was back in China from March to July and everything was back to normal with the exception of mask wearing in certain areas and no international travel. My dd’s Former school has a Halloween party at the end of this month, they have after school activities, clubs, sleepovers and parents’ meetings: meanwhile here she is in a bubble busy disinfecting her desk 6 times per day.

I don't know the reason. It's almost like they've managed it better than us

I don't understand why people think China would be unable to keep a lid on this virus. They had lots of practice with SARS and they are able to exert heavy control over the Chinese people with very little regard for human rights

Together with Asian Flu and Avian flu, shouldn’t we be questioning why China seems to be the epicentre for these diseases.

They all seem to be linked to animals. Maybe until China gets its animal husbandry under control we boycott goods and services from the country.

Maybe they need instead of making untold efforts to hide their mistakes they make the same effort to make sure another outbreak of something even more deadly doesn’t cone out of this country

If they have such power over people then surely they can rule that cleaner and more humane practices are adhered to when dealing with animals.

Or do they have a different agenda.

Don't eat meat if you don't want animals kept in close proximity like that! It isn't just China

Or buy from local butchers and farm shops where you know the provenance of the meat @shoofle.

Don't eat meat if you don't want animals kept in close proximity like that! It isn't just China

Personally I don’t.

Everywhere else eats meat and doesn’t have these viral outbreaks.
Shouldn’t we be looking at what China does that leaves them open to keep producing these viruses.

I was wondering this too.

I doubt we will ever know. China is a super power and close to a dictatorship so absolutely no point in comparing us to them as 1) we are not a super power and not even close to what China can do in the modern world 2) we are are in no way as motivated as the Chinese citizens to do as we are told ( possibly due to Chinas human right records. Not sure we should aim for that level of compliance because its has partially been achieved by the real threat of death. Not by Corona but by state hands).

One day we will look back and know but its pointless guessing

But China is huge with a huge population - statistically more likely to happen there than in some small fry place like Britain.

I too am veggie - I'm saying it's a little hypocritical to blame their meat industry when ours is also a state

[quote Bool]@ShanghaiDiva I find your last two posts scary. Especially when you say you are glad you don’t live in a democracy. Has it really come to this now![/quote]
Well yes for me because time and time again these democrats are sabotaging our economy and allowing China to take advantage. There are too many not following the rules and people supporting them as it's my rights, do you think China would let someone with a "hidden disabilities" off wearing a mask on return? Of course not. We need a dose of authoritarianism now too many people are too selfish to care about the country's overall interest.

I too am veggie - I'm saying it's a little hypocritical to blame their meat industry when ours is also a state

Yet we or any other country around the world that have some form of food industry legislation haven’t managed to produce multiple viruses that have killed millions.

China might be doing well but how well would they be doing if governments sued them for the financial costs of this virus alone.
They refused to tell the world that they had produced another virus or that it had already spread out of the country.

WHO needs to take some of the blame given their insistence that on January 23rd 2020 it hadn’t left China.

As a country we were never going to adhere to lockdowns or isolating.
We can blame Boris and the government all we like but not everyone is going to stay in and stop spreading the virus even now.

I think the government knowing that a percentage of the population is just going to do what ever they like regardless of the risk to themselves or others are hoping for some sort of herd immunity whilst trying to keep hospital admissions down to give everyone a fighting chance.

I know of more people through friends of dds. (Not in this country) who have committed suicide because of the harsh lockdowns than I know people who have died from Covid.

I am much happier living here in the UK. Even if it is all such a mess atm than I would be living under Chinese rule where restrictions are there 24/7 with or without Covid.

China has implemented more controls with regard to markets, but clearly it’s an issue that need to be monitored. Having traveled extensively within China and Asia, standards in some areas are well below what we expect in the west. The problem is not unique to china: unsanitary conditions, lack of refrigeration and potential cross contamination can be seen in Cambodia, Vietnam, India, Laos, Bhutan ..
With regard to people doing as they are told in China, the fear factor has more to do with fear of the virus than fear of govt reprisals. Mask wearing is pretty common anyway so making it compulsory to wear a mask in shops etc is not so difficult to implement and frankly back in January we had no real idea what was happening with regard to the virus and were happy to comply. (I was living 500km from Wuhan when the virus started to spread)

Having lived in China for 12 years and now back in the uk what I find frustrating is how slowly we reacted here. We saw what was happening in China, Taiwan, HK, Italy and yet we just carried on watching..
When I came back in Feb from HK with many Chinese residents on board there were no checks at Heathrow, no questions..nothing.

ShanghaiDiva

Yet the controls are still not working.

As you said the conditions are still unsanitary and are going to lead to more outbreaks
Why if everyone adheres to the government directives better conditions aren’t being seen throughout the country with regard to food production. Or is the food industry somehow exempt?

I think the general public might not have known about the virus in China but the government was warned and spent time trying to discredit the messenger/s in December and appears to have attempted to cover up what was going on.

The food industry is not exempt. There is a huge difference between the east and west of China. Some markets and supermarkets in the east are clean and hygienic. In the west, meat is often sold outside, no refrigeration and I have seen animals slaughtered in the street and this was in a large city, not the countryside. It will take time, money and education to raise standards everywhere.

If they have such power over people then surely they can rule that cleaner and more humane practices are adhered to when dealing with animals.

This is a very good point.