Asian Angle | China’s zero-Covid policy, botched reopening will puzzle historians for years to come
- Beijing abruptly ended its strict zero-Covid stance after three years but analysts will spend many more figuring out the true cost of the policy
- It remains to be seen whether and how quickly the scarring done to parts of China’s economy can be reversed by its eventual reopening
It has become apparent that mainland China has botched its Covid-19 reopening. After three years of maintaining a strict zero-Covid policy, the surprise at its about-face has been surpassed only by questions as to why such a costly, unsustainable policy was pursued for so long.
Economists and historians will spend years trying to find the answers to three mysteries in relation to China’s (mis)handling of the pandemic.
First is the question of what the true costs of the zero-Covid policy were, and in particular, whether they were worth paying.
Most credible estimates point to more than a million Covid deaths over the next three months. Given the economic damage that zero-Covid wrought – especially in 2022 when the rest of the world had already lifted most pandemic-era restrictions – historians and economists will inevitably ask: what was it all for?
An analysis of zero-Covid’s consequences ought to also include direct health costs, especially the excess deaths caused by other conditions not treated as a result zero-Covid restrictions, lost output from economic shutdowns, and the harm caused to people’s lives and mental health as a result of extended lockdowns and the sometimes arbitrary quarantining of millions of people.
The second mystery historians will try to solve is why a policy as obviously short-sighted and unsustainable as zero-Covid was maintained for so long and with such ideological fervour.
What happened to the much-vaunted pragmatism, scientific approach and long-term thinking that were the hallmarks of the Chinese state in the first 40 years of reform and opening-up?
