In China, called the number of deaths from COVID: tens of thousands of deaths

Nearly 60,000 people have died from COVID-19 in China over the past five weeks. This coronavirus death toll is only for those who died in hospital, and the true figure could likely be higher, although officials say the death toll has passed the peak in most areas.

Authorities have announced that almost 60,000 people have died of covid in Chinese hospitals since early December, when the country eased its strict quarantine restrictions.

According to The Observer, a major wave of the spread of the coronavirus has swept the country after Xi Jinping abruptly lifted political restrictions related to the “zero COVID” policy last month. It is estimated that since then some major cities have had infection rates between 70% and 90% of their population.

The sharp rise in infections is attributed to the fact that the Chinese government is focusing on protecting the 1.4 billion people that make up the country’s population, instead of effectively vaccinating them against the COVID-19 virus, The Observer emphasizes.

Death reports on social media and long queues at morgues and crematoria point to China’s high death toll, but until Saturday, authorities had officially registered only a few dozen deaths from COVID-19.

The decline in reported numbers was driven by rigid definitions of how deaths are attributed to COVID in China. Only people who died of respiratory failure were counted. The World Health Organization last week criticized this new definition as too narrow and warned that it does not adequately reflect the true impact of the outbreak. But the Chinese authorities responded that it was not necessary to attribute every death to covid.

However, Jiao Yahui, head of the National Health Commission’s medical affairs department, announced on Saturday that 59,938 Covid deaths had actually occurred between December 8 and January 12. This figure included about 5,500 people who died of respiratory failure, while the rest also had comorbidities (such as cancer and cardiovascular disease). According to Jiao, the average age of those who died was 80, with 90.1% of them aged 65 or older.

The death toll only includes those who died in hospital and is likely still below the true total, while there were serious concerns about further spread of the virus ahead of the lunar new year holiday starting next week. Holidays in China officially begin on January 21 and are associated with the world’s largest annual human migration. About 2 billion trips are expected to be made and tens of millions of people have already begun to travel, although they have been urged not to visit their elderly relatives to prevent them from becoming infected.

Jiao says the number of cases is declining and has passed the peak in most areas. She said the daily number of people visiting fever clinics peaked at 2.9 million on Dec. 23 and dropped 83% to 477,000 on Thursday. “These data show that the peak of the state of emergency in the country has passed,” she said.

The Chinese government has been criticized by other governments and the World Health Organization for its lack of transparency. Authorities stopped releasing most infection data after the surge began, and the WHO has condemned Beijing for grossly underreporting the number of people who have contracted COVID-19 and become seriously ill with complications from the virus.

Several countries have imposed travel restrictions or mandatory testing on arrivals from China, prompting some retaliation from Beijing against Japan and South Korea.

China’s problems have also been exacerbated by the fact that the authorities have allowed only domestically produced vaccines to be given to their citizens. Health and medical research experts have raised concerns about the effectiveness of China’s vaccines, which use an inactivated virus, compared to mRNA vaccines, such as the one made by BioNTech/Pfizer, that are available in other countries.

The lifting of travel restrictions has also led to an increase in services offering travel to Hong Kong and Macau, where the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine is provided free of charge to residents. Clinics in Thailand and Singapore also reported increased interest from Chinese travelers.

According to CNN, WHO Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus spoke with Chinese Health Minister Ma Xiaowei on Saturday about the spike in infections. Chinese officials shared information including the latest data on outpatient clinics, hospital admissions, patients requiring emergency and intensive care, and hospital deaths, the WHO said in a statement.

“WHO is analyzing this information, which covers the period from early December 2022 to January 12, 2023, and allows us to better understand the epidemiological situation and the impact of this wave in China,” the report said. The health organization also requested a more detailed breakdown of data by province over time and asked the Chinese government to continue to share further coronavirus sequences with open access databases.