Prominent Chinese commentator Hu Xijin (胡錫進) on Sunday said that as China ponders its COVID-19 policies, epidemic experts need to speak out and China ought to conduct comprehensive research and make any studies transparent to the public.
Hu’s unusual call on Chinese social media for candor and transparency earned him 34,000 likes on the popular Sina Weibo microblogging platform, as well as frank responses from commentators in a normally tightly policed Internet quick to censor voices deemed a risk to social stability.
China’s top leaders warned in May amid the COVID-19 lockdown of Shanghai and widespread restrictions in the Chinese capital, Beijing, that they would fight any comment or action that distorted, doubted or repudiated the country’s COVID-19 policies.
Photo: Reuters
“About the future, China needs very rational research and calculations,” said Hu, a former editor-in-chief of nationalist state tabloid the Global Times.
“Experts must speak out, and the country should organize comprehensive studies and make them transparent to the public: What are the pros and cons for our common people, and what are the overall pros and cons for the country?” he wrote.
China has significantly tightened its epidemic prevention policies this year to contain the spread of the highly transmissible Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, even as its death toll since the COVID-19 pandemic began remains low — about 5,226 as of Saturday — and as many other countries let go of tough restrictions and learn to live with the virus.
“Oppose excessive epidemic prevention,” one user wrote in response to Hu’s post.
In the name of putting the lives of people first, entire cities have been subjected to varying degrees of lockdown, while the infected or suspected cases are confined in facilities or at home, and local populations are required to take a polymerase chain reaction test every two to three days or be barred from public amenities and spaces.
“I don’t mind being infected, but I fear you can’t help but stop me from moving freely,” another person wrote.
Even Chinese-controlled Hong Kong is moving to scrap its controversial COVID-19 hotel quarantine policy for all arrivals, more than two-and-a-half years after it was first implemented, and just weeks ahead of a major Chinese Communist Party congress in Beijing next month when President Xi Jinping (習近平) is expected to secure a precedent-breaking third term as China’s leader.
Macau is also planning to reopen its borders to mainland tour groups in November, the Chinese special administrative region surprised with an announcement on Saturday.
“The people must trust the state, but the state must also trust the understanding of the people,” Hu said.
OPTIMISTIC: A Philippine Air Force spokeswoman said the military believed the crew were safe and were hopeful that they and the jet would be recovered A Philippine Air Force FA-50 jet and its two-person crew are missing after flying in support of ground forces fighting communist rebels in the southern Mindanao region, a military official said yesterday. Philippine Air Force spokeswoman Colonel Consuelo Castillo said the jet was flying “over land” on the way to its target area when it went missing during a “tactical night operation in support of our ground troops.” While she declined to provide mission specifics, Philippine Army spokesman Colonel Louie Dema-ala confirmed that the missing FA-50 was part of a squadron sent “to provide air support” to troops fighting communist rebels in
Two daughters of an Argentine mountaineer who died on an icy peak 40 years ago have retrieved his backpack from the spot — finding camera film inside that allowed them a glimpse of some of his final experiences. Guillermo Vieiro was 44 when he died in 1985 — as did his climbing partner — while descending Argentina’s Tupungato lava dome, one of the highest peaks in the Americas. Last year, his backpack was spotted on a slope by mountaineer Gabriela Cavallaro, who examined it and contacted Vieiro’s daughters Guadalupe, 40, and Azul, 44. Last month, the three set out with four other guides
ECONOMIC DISTORTION? The US commerce secretary’s remarks echoed Elon Musk’s arguments that spending by the government does not create value for the economy US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Sunday said that government spending could be separated from GDP reports, in response to questions about whether the spending cuts pushed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency could possibly cause an economic downturn. “You know that governments historically have messed with GDP,” Lutnick said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures. “They count government spending as part of GDP. So I’m going to separate those two and make it transparent.” Doing so could potentially complicate or distort a fundamental measure of the US economy’s health. Government spending is traditionally included in the GDP because
Sri Lanka’s fragile economic recovery could be hampered by threatened trade union strikes over reduced benefits for government employees in this year’s budget, the IMF said yesterday. Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s maiden budget raised public sector salaries, but also made deep cuts to longstanding perks in a continuing effort to repair the island nation’s tattered finances. Sri Lanka’s main doctors’ union is considering a strike from today to protest against cuts to their allowances, while teachers are also considering stoppages. IMF senior mission chief for Sri Lanka Peter Breuer said the budget was the “last big push” for the country’s austerity
RSS