Page 28 - 2021 White Paper
P. 28
1 White Paper on the Business Environment in China
movements were severely curtailed. Dozens of Still, it does not necessarily follow that China's
cities implemented family outdoor restrictions, response to the pandemic is generalizable. “As
which typically meant that only one member of each country has its own health system and
each household was permitted to leave the home epidemic curve, measures implemented in one
every couple of days to collect necessary supplies. country may not be easily replicated by another”,
Within weeks, China had managed to test nine points out Imperial College London's Han Fu.
million people for Covid in Wuhan. It set up an “Other factors such as coordination between
effective national system of contact tracing. By government sectors and civil compliance with
contrast, the UK's capacity for contact tracing was regulations may also affect the effectiveness
overwhelmed soon after the pandemic struck the o f t h e re s p o n s e”. M u c h a l s o d e p e n d s o n e a c h
country. As the world's largest manufacturer of nation's conception of civil liberties. Gregory
personal protective equipment, it was relatively Poland, director of the Vaccine Research Group
straightforward for China to ramp up production at the Mayo Clinic said, “In China, you have a
of clinical gowns and surgical masks. Moreover, combination of a population that takes respiratory
the Chinese readily adopted mask wearing. infections seriously and is willing to adopt non-
Compliance was very high compare to the US. pharmaceutical interventions, with a government
While the virus was surging, people still refused that can put bigger constraints on individual
to wear masks. Even in late September, President freedoms than would be considered acceptable
Trump treated Joe Biden's mask-wearing as a in most Western countries… Commitment to the
weakness to be ridiculed. Drones equipped with greater good is engrained in the culture; there
echoing loudspeakers rebuked Chinese citizens is not the hyper-individualism that characterizes
who were not following the rules. Then, state- parts of the US, and has driven most of the
run Xinhua news agency has released footage resistance to the countermeasures against the
taken from the drones. In the UK, 150,000 people c o r o n a v i r u s .” Po l a n d n o t e d t h a t t h e C h i n e s e
were permitted to attend a horse racing meet accept the notion that disease control is a matter
in mid-March, 10 days before the country went of science. “China does not have the kind of
into lockdown. In August, 460,000 Americans raucous anti-vaccine, anti-science movement that
congregated in Sturgis, South Dakota, for a is trying to derail the fight against Covid-19 in the
motorcycle rally. Wuhan opened three so-called USA”, he said (Burki).
Fangcang hospitals in February 2020. Another
13 would appear over the next few weeks. The Everything done in China to prevent the spread
hospitals were established within public venues of coronavirus was done with a heavy hand. It was
such as stadiums and exhibition centers and were necessary to waste as little time as possible. A
used to isolate patients with mild-to-moderate heavy hand to force people to do what is right may
symptoms of Covid-19. Patients who started to not always be the answer, but it was the invisible
show symptoms of severe disease were quickly hand of the free market may have done the most
transferred to conventional hospitals. The network damage. The US is the world’s richest country, and
of Fangcang hospitals, which held 13,000 beds, home to 10 of the 20 largest diagnostic companies
meant that patients with Covid-19 did not have in the world. And yet, it not only has suffered
to isolate at home, which reduced the risk of more deaths from Covid-19 than any other
family members becoming infected. By March, country, but also remains highly vulnerable to a
the Fangcang hospitals were no longer needed. continued escalation. The reason is simple: there
From around the same time, the focus of China's are not enough diagnostic tests. During a disease
countermeasures shifted from controlling local outbreak, medicines and vaccines understandably
transmission to preventing the virus from taking get a lot of attention. But diagnostics are effectively
hold as a result of imported cases. Those who a first line of defense against transmission,
entered the country were tested and quarantined. particularly for a disease like Covid-19, which
A modelling study calculated that the public health can be spread by asymptomatic carriers. As the
actions undertaken by China between in the month divergent experiences of the US and South Korea
of February alone may have prevented as many as show, testing can be the difference between
four million infections and 56,000 deaths (Burki). containment and catastrophe. The Covid-19
28
movements were severely curtailed. Dozens of Still, it does not necessarily follow that China's
cities implemented family outdoor restrictions, response to the pandemic is generalizable. “As
which typically meant that only one member of each country has its own health system and
each household was permitted to leave the home epidemic curve, measures implemented in one
every couple of days to collect necessary supplies. country may not be easily replicated by another”,
Within weeks, China had managed to test nine points out Imperial College London's Han Fu.
million people for Covid in Wuhan. It set up an “Other factors such as coordination between
effective national system of contact tracing. By government sectors and civil compliance with
contrast, the UK's capacity for contact tracing was regulations may also affect the effectiveness
overwhelmed soon after the pandemic struck the o f t h e re s p o n s e”. M u c h a l s o d e p e n d s o n e a c h
country. As the world's largest manufacturer of nation's conception of civil liberties. Gregory
personal protective equipment, it was relatively Poland, director of the Vaccine Research Group
straightforward for China to ramp up production at the Mayo Clinic said, “In China, you have a
of clinical gowns and surgical masks. Moreover, combination of a population that takes respiratory
the Chinese readily adopted mask wearing. infections seriously and is willing to adopt non-
Compliance was very high compare to the US. pharmaceutical interventions, with a government
While the virus was surging, people still refused that can put bigger constraints on individual
to wear masks. Even in late September, President freedoms than would be considered acceptable
Trump treated Joe Biden's mask-wearing as a in most Western countries… Commitment to the
weakness to be ridiculed. Drones equipped with greater good is engrained in the culture; there
echoing loudspeakers rebuked Chinese citizens is not the hyper-individualism that characterizes
who were not following the rules. Then, state- parts of the US, and has driven most of the
run Xinhua news agency has released footage resistance to the countermeasures against the
taken from the drones. In the UK, 150,000 people c o r o n a v i r u s .” Po l a n d n o t e d t h a t t h e C h i n e s e
were permitted to attend a horse racing meet accept the notion that disease control is a matter
in mid-March, 10 days before the country went of science. “China does not have the kind of
into lockdown. In August, 460,000 Americans raucous anti-vaccine, anti-science movement that
congregated in Sturgis, South Dakota, for a is trying to derail the fight against Covid-19 in the
motorcycle rally. Wuhan opened three so-called USA”, he said (Burki).
Fangcang hospitals in February 2020. Another
13 would appear over the next few weeks. The Everything done in China to prevent the spread
hospitals were established within public venues of coronavirus was done with a heavy hand. It was
such as stadiums and exhibition centers and were necessary to waste as little time as possible. A
used to isolate patients with mild-to-moderate heavy hand to force people to do what is right may
symptoms of Covid-19. Patients who started to not always be the answer, but it was the invisible
show symptoms of severe disease were quickly hand of the free market may have done the most
transferred to conventional hospitals. The network damage. The US is the world’s richest country, and
of Fangcang hospitals, which held 13,000 beds, home to 10 of the 20 largest diagnostic companies
meant that patients with Covid-19 did not have in the world. And yet, it not only has suffered
to isolate at home, which reduced the risk of more deaths from Covid-19 than any other
family members becoming infected. By March, country, but also remains highly vulnerable to a
the Fangcang hospitals were no longer needed. continued escalation. The reason is simple: there
From around the same time, the focus of China's are not enough diagnostic tests. During a disease
countermeasures shifted from controlling local outbreak, medicines and vaccines understandably
transmission to preventing the virus from taking get a lot of attention. But diagnostics are effectively
hold as a result of imported cases. Those who a first line of defense against transmission,
entered the country were tested and quarantined. particularly for a disease like Covid-19, which
A modelling study calculated that the public health can be spread by asymptomatic carriers. As the
actions undertaken by China between in the month divergent experiences of the US and South Korea
of February alone may have prevented as many as show, testing can be the difference between
four million infections and 56,000 deaths (Burki). containment and catastrophe. The Covid-19
28
