China can learn from Omicron to protect the elderly: health expert
- The country must look for a way that unlike the West, does not sacrifice so many lives, Zeng Guang says
- Hong Kong is a more relevant example for the mainland, he says
Zeng Guang, a member of the National Health Commission’s expert panel, said that if the country could find a way through the pandemic and open up, it would be without sacrificing so many lives, “like in the West”.
“Will China eventually be able to open its doors and live with the virus? If we do manage that, it will be based on a Covid-19 control road map for China, which is not easy [to draw up], given the health of 1.4 billion people,” he said.
“Getting into close contact with and handling [Omicron] allow us to fully understand our opponent, how fatal it is, the loopholes in our existing control policy and how we can protect our elderly.”
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Beijing adopts ‘dynamic zero-Covid’ strategy amid surge in Omicron cases
Mainland China is battling its worst outbreak of locally transmitted cases since it contained the epidemic in Wuhan in 2020.