Opinion Today: What China’s zero-Covid policy could mean for the U.S.

"The coronavirus is not going to disappear — the world will have to live with it."

View in browser|nytimes.com Continue reading the main story January 26, 2022 By Chris Conway Senior Staff Editor, Opinion China's no-tolerance policy on Covid has served it well so far. The world's most populous country, with more than 1.4 billion people, has had fewer than 140,000 confirmed Covid cases and fewer than 6,000 deaths since January 2020 according to the World Health Organization. Compare that to the United States, with more than a billion fewer people. The virus has claimed the lives of more than 860,000 Americans, and roughly 2,000 continue to die each day. China's crackdown is typified by its no-nonsense approach to the coming Olympics, in which the athletes and their coaches will face severe restrictions and be confined to an Olympic bubble to prevent spread of any errant Covid variant. In a guest essay this week two prominent health experts, Ezekiel Emanuel of the University of Pennsylvania and Michael Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, warn that China's effort to seal off the country from the virus has set the nation up for disaster. Omicron is much more transmissible than previous variants, which will make it impossible to contain. They say China's population does not have the immunity to fight off the Omicron variant, which is becoming endemic and will spread throughout the country, nor does it have effective vaccines or the health care system to deal with millions of virus-infected patients. But the implications extend beyond China's border, Emanuel and Osterholm warn, as the pandemic strikes the country's economy. "Declines in Chinese production would upend supply chains and the availability of goods everywhere, including in the United States," they write. And that won't be good for anyone. Read the full essay here. 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