Geneva : The World Health Organization officials, who have tussle with Beijing’s tight control of data access throughout the pandemic, has criticised China for not revealing the exact data Covid-19 cases.
China is being blamed for under-representing the infected cases and narrowing the number of the deaths while the population of billions was on risk.
“We continue to ask China for more rapid, regular, reliable data on hospitalisations and deaths, as well as more comprehensive, real-time viral sequencing,” WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a media briefing in Geneva January 4.
“WHO is concerned about the risk to life in China and has reiterated the importance of vaccination, including booster doses, to protect against hospitalisation, severe disease, and death,” he said.
Mike Ryan, WHO executive director for health emergencies, said that the numbers released by China “under-represent the true impact of the disease” in terms of hospital and ICU admissions and deaths. He acknowledged that many countries had seen lags in reporting hospital data but pointed to China’s “narrow” definition of a Covid death as a contributing factor.
According to figures released on the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention website, less than 20 local Covid cases-related deaths were reported in China in the two weeks before January 5.
The country only lists those Covid patients who succumbed to respiratory failure.China continues to battle the sudden surge in Covid cases following the relaxation of the zero-Covid policy of the Chinese Communist Party.
Chinese hospitals and crematoriums are also struggling with an rush of patients and dead bodies, with rural areas facing most of the brunt.
On January 5, China’s Foreign Ministry said the country has always shared epidemic information “in a timely, open and transparent manner” and insisted its Covid situation was “under control,”.Earlier this week ,they decried the measures as unscientific and vowed to take “corresponding countermeasures for different situations in accordance with the principle of reciprocity.”
The Chinese authorities have been circulating a narrative that the peak of the current Covid wave had already passed in most of the cities including Beijing, in order to address the concerns of both domestic and international communities and to justify the CCP’s announcement regarding further relaxation of epidemic prevention and control measures from January 8
Incidentally, the scale of the current outbreak of the Covid infections has made it difficult for the authorities to track the Covid infections, following the end of the mandatory mass testing as part of the easing of Covid restrictions.
However, the Chinese authorities have circulated a narrative that the peak of the current Covid wave had already passed in the cities including Beijing, in order to address the concerns of both domestic and international communities and to justify the CCP’s announcement regarding further relaxation of epidemic prevention and control measures from January 8, reported CNN.
Rural areas may witness a further surge of Covid infections due to the return of the workforce from cities to their respective villages ,with the annual holidays commencing on January 15.
The surge in cases in a country of 1.4 billion has raised global concerns about the potential emergence of new variants.
Many countries have implemented Covid testing requirements for travellers from China, citing a dearth of data on strains circulating there.
According to a statement released by the Swedish presidency of the bloc on January 4, the European Union “strongly encouraged” its member states to introduce a requirement for a negative Covid test for passengers travelling from China to the EU.
