Editorial | As mainland China reopens, Hong Kong offers some valuable lessons
- City’s painful experience can help authorities across the border plan safeguards and manage the risks that come with living with the virus
As mainland China pressed on alone with its stringent zero-Covid policy last spring, few would have imagined that in less than a year it would be drawing on Hong Kong’s experience to manage the risk of changing course in order to ameliorate social and economic disruption.
This means living with the highly transmissible Omicron strain of the virus without a regime of mass quarantine and testing, lockdowns and other strict measures, as Hong Kong has done.
When a fifth wave of Covid-19 hit Hong Kong last February, relatively few of the city’s elderly were vaccinated, especially those aged over 80. This was to result in the world’s highest Covid death rate for population size.
This risk profile is now mirrored among the 1.4 billion mainlanders, with only 40 per cent of over-80s having had recommended booster shots and fears the Omicron strain and its many subvariants are spreading quickly.
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Small businesses still struggling in Wuhan despite easing of Covid restrictions in China
Beijing has no time to lose in learning the lessons from Hong Kong. One is that vaccination against serious symptoms and wearing masks to prevent transmission were paramount in bringing the fifth wave under control.