Prognosis
Covid Unleashed in Beijing Shows Rest of China What’s Next
- China’s capital has surging infections, shortages of medicine
- China abruptly dropped much of Covid Zero about a week ago
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Beijing’s rapidly spreading Covid outbreak has turned the Chinese capital of 22 million people into a virtual ghost town as stores close and restaurants empty, underscoring the cost of President Xi Jinping’s sudden pivot away from Covid Zero.
Bucking expectations for a managed and gradual transition, Xi’s government is now allowing the virus to run rampant. While officials have abandoned efforts to track case numbers, anecdotal evidence suggests entire families and offices in Beijing have become infected in the span of just days — a potential harbinger of worse things to come in other parts of China with less-developed health care systems.