XiJinping’s Failing”Zero-Covid” Policy and Vaccine Diplomacy

By Vikram Pandya

Xi Jinping’s “zero-Covid” policy appears to have failed miserably as China is still struggling to cope up with the daily rising Covid cases inside the country.

At least 1,000 new cases of the virus are found in China every day (in the recent wave), prompting the government to impose its draconian “zero-Covid policy” which has caused fear, anger, and confusion among the Chinese people. At present, 31 cities in China are under lockdown, and over 232 million people’s lives have been affected. During Xi’s leadership till date, nothing has rocked the Chinese society as much as “zero-Covid” policy (Xi’s brain child).

Under this scheme, China has continued mass testing, extensive quarantines and snap lockdowns to stamp out infections at all costs, even as the rest of the world has learned to live with the virus. People are fearful about their livelihood since “zero-Covid” has dealt a serious blow to their incomes and has caused job losses. Constant lockdowns have dramatically shrunk the pace of growth in China’s economy.

Recent monthly surveys showed sentiment among manufacturing and services businesses fell to the lowest since the initial shock of the pandemic in February 2020.

According to EU Chamber of Commerce in China, nearly 60% of European businesses in the country said that they are cutting 2022 revenue projections as a result of Covid controls. Youth unemployment has reached a record 20% while heavily indebted local governments are forced to spend on mass Covid testing.

The fear of lockdown could be seen in the migrant workers employed in China’s largest iPhone factory in Covid-hit Zhengzhou. A recent viral video depicts hundreds of migrant workers have been fleeing back to their hometowns from the country’s largest iPhone factory in Zhengzhou, amidst a lockdown triggered by a Covid outbreak. As per the BBC report, workers have broken out of Apple’s largest assembly site, escaping the lockdown at Foxconn in Zhengzhou. After sneaking out, they were seen walking to hometowns more than 100 kilometres away to beat the Covid app measures designed to control people and stop this.

Meanwhile, months after staying indoors and in quarantine camps, people sit on streets of Guangzhou to show their zero tolerance for China’s anti-COVID policy (November 14).

Videos of a large number of protesters chanting slogans and walking on streets have gone viral on different social media platforms. The protest turned violent when people refused to go to the quarantine centre.

Days ago, videos of soft protests against the unavailability of food and edible items during lockdown emerged on the TikTok platform. In the protest, people were seen dancing with an empty bowl to a Bollywood retro song, ‘Jimmy Jimmy’, which means ‘Give me Rice’ in Mandarin.

China’s mega-cities have been facing shortages of food, emergency medical care, and other essential services and products due to unprecedented and long lockdowns. The “bridge man” protest prior to the Party Congress which draped two banners from Sitong Bridge in Beijing, bearing blunt criticism of Xi and his Covid policies also shows the frustration of the common people.

The term ‘zero-Covid Policy’ or ‘Covid Zero’ was coined by Xi and the Party early in the Pandemic. While the strategy proved a success in earlier waves, a more transmissible variant in Omicron, the rising costs of lockdowns, soft domestic consumption, a deteriorating fiscal situation and increasing dissatisfaction among its population are causing diminishing benefits of the policy.

The approach has become the subject of renewed debate by economists, who say the cost to the economy is becoming increasingly unbearable. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus also stated (May 10) that China’s zero-tolerance strategy is not sustainable and that it was time for a change in approach.

In China’s fight against Covid, one thing Xi has so far been unwilling to do is to use foreign made mRNA vaccines. Xi’s government has touted self-reliance in fighting Covid, promoting domestic vaccines based on inactivated versions of the virus and barring all foreign ones from the market. Opening up to foreign-made mRNA shots risks embarrassing Xi and other officials as it may portray that Chinese vaccines are not good enough.

A preprint study by researchers at the University of Hong Kong (March, 2022) concluded that two doses of the Sinovac vaccine underperformed. Another study by Hong Kong researchers in the journal Nature concluded (January 2022) that governments primarily using Sinovac’s vaccines should consider mRNA vaccine boosters in response to the spread of Omicron. The argument is winning support inside China. Ding Sheng, dean of Tsinghua University’s School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, in March also noted that existing Chinese vaccines weren’t protective enough against omicron and that the government should encourage companies to introduce more effective shots.

Lack of transparency over Chinese vaccines’ efficacy and waning durability has worried many Chinese as well. According to interviews and private social media chat groups seen by the Financial Times (report published on December 07, 2021) , Chinese parents have over recent months quietly sought to resist giving consent for their children’s shots. Reports have also suggested that provincial and municipal governments in China claimed adverse reactions of Chinese vaccines in China including deaths and severe disability of the recipients.

When China floated its vaccine diplomacy in 2020, it also started exploiting economically weaker countries to conduct human trials of Chinese vaccines. This did not go wel with many countries. Local people of Bangladesh protested. Meanwhile, countries like Bahrain, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vitenam, Chile, Philippines, Seychelles, Mongolia and Brazil faced inefficacy using Chinese vaccines which led to a lot of internal criticism.

As Xi has placed his personal stamp firmly on the ‘zero-Covid Policy’ objective driving unbending measures, the prolonged lockdown has sparked huge criticism within and outside the country. The ongoing outbreak threatens to spiral into a national crisis of the government’s own making.

Under the current “zero-Covid” policy, the task of preventing a Covid outbreak is outweighing the imperative goal of economic growth, usually the most critical policy goal in the cadre responsible system. The anxiety is visible as China’s leaders through official posts, state media and social media threatened action against critics of the policy, which authorities say ‘puts life first’.

Chinese people have had to accept less political freedom in exchange for rising standards of living, employment, and economic growth. This unwritten contract has prevented mass social unrest, human-rights abuses and political crackdowns notwithstanding. But if Xi continues to prioritize his Covid policy over economic growth and human well-being, people will begin to lose hope in the future, and that contract may be breached.

Throughout China’s long history, an economically desperate population has ousted failed leaders and toppled governments many times. Will Xi’s “yes men” alert him to impending danger? Despite his obsession with personal loyalty and social stability, Xi appears intent to forge ahead with a failed policy to deal with a virus that originated from China. The question is whether this stubbornness will cost him the things he values most.