Launch patriotic health campaign: Xi tells officials in China’s first speech on coronavirus

International

oi-Prakash KL

“China’s Covid-19 prevention and control is facing a new situation and new tasks,” said the Chinese president.

Beijing, December 26: Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke for the first time about the situation amid reports that more than 250 million people have been infected with the coronavirus in three weeks.

“Currently, China’s Covid-19 prevention and control is facing new situations and new tasks,” the Chinese president said in an instruction, according to CCTV.

Xi Jinping said: “We must carry out patriotic health campaigns in a more targeted manner…to build a solid community defense line for epidemic prevention and control, and effectively protect the safety and health of the people.”

Chinese hospitals and crematoria are overwhelmed with Covid-19 patients. China’s National Health Commission announced on Sunday that it would stop publishing daily national figures for infections and infections, following a leaked document claiming that more than 250 million people have been affected by Covid-19 since its strict zero-Covid-19 policy was lifted a few weeks ago. Death statistics.

However, China has acknowledged that it will be “impossible” to trace cases after mandatory mass testing ends because people are now not obliged to report test results to authorities.

According to health officials in Zhejiang province, 1 million people in the region are affected by Covid-19 every day, with Qingdao seeing 500,000 new daily infections and Dongguan 250,000 to 300,000.

The country’s zero-COVID policy deployed mass testing and strict quarantine measures, which were revised earlier this month in response to anti-government protests.

Several cities in China have endured prolonged lockdowns, often sparked by a small number of infections, and there are signs that people are starting to lose patience.

The National Health Commission’s announcement came days after protests took place in several cities, including in Shanghai, with crowds chanting “We don’t want COVID-19 testing, we want freedom.”

Meanwhile, ICUs in Beijing remained under pressure as community transmission of Omicron led to increasingly severe cases, most of them elderly, in a short period of time, the state-run Global Times reported on Saturday.

Beijing has so far acknowledged just seven deaths linked to the virus, amid reports of rising deaths in morgues and crematoria.

According to the opinion of the institution