BEIJING: When nadia 85-year-old father succumbed to COVID-like symptoms as the virus spread through their hometown in the south-eastern province of Jiangxi, she was devastated.
Nadia believes that COVID-19 was the cause of her father's death, despite the fact that he was never tested. On the other hand, she and her mother both tested positive around the same time.
Advertisement During the Chinese New Year holiday that begins on January 21, hundreds of millions of Chinese will travel to reunite with their families. Many of them will do so after mourning relatives who died in the COVID-19 epidemic that has swept the world's largest population.
When China abruptly ended its zero-COVID policy in December 2022 after three years of testing, travel restrictions, and lockdowns, many people's grief is mixed with anger over what they say was a lack of preparation to protect the elderly.
Nadia, 56, stated that, like many Chinese, she had advocated for the economy to be reopened. In late December, a few weeks after China lifted its COVID-19 restrictions, her father passed away.
She stated over the phone, "We wanted things to open up, but not in this way – not at the expense of so many elderly people, which has a huge impact on every family."
China announced on Saturday (January 14) that there had been nearly 60,000 COVID-related hospital deaths since the end of zero-COVID, a 10-fold increase from previous figures. However, many international experts contend that this is an undercount in part due to the fact that it does not include people who died at home, such as Nadia's father.
A Chinese official said on Saturday that 90% of those who died were 65 or older, and the average age was 80.3 years.
China rejects the criticism that many experts have leveled against it, asserting that it did not take advantage of the three-year ban on COVID-19 to better prepare its population, particularly its hundreds of millions of elderly people, for reopening.
The lack of therapeutic drugs and inadequate vaccination rates among older people were cited as shortcomings.
On January 6, a Chinese official said that more than 90% of people over 60 had been vaccinated. However, as of November 28, the most recent date for which that data was available, only 40% of people over 80 had received booster shots.
"If only they used the resources used to control the virus to protect the elderly," said Nadia, who, like many of the people interviewed, declined to use their full name because criticizing China's government is sensitive.
Advertisement Chinese officials have repeatedly emphasized the significance of safeguarding the elderly, announcing a variety of initiatives, including vaccination drives and the establishment of a task force in Shanghai, China's largest city, to identify groups at high risk.
After rare and widespread street protests against the policy in late November, Beijing decided to end zero-COVID. However, most public complaints about China's handling of the end of COVID-19 curbs have been made via heavily censored social media.
China's handling of COVID-19, according to a number of analysts, had diminished confidence in the government, particularly among upper-middle-class urban residents, but they did not consider it a threat to President Xi Jinping or the Communist Party.
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