China to boost elderly vaccination amid reopening pressure

CHINA has said it will bolster vaccination among its senior citizens, a move regarded by health experts as crucial to its reopening.

The nation’s economy has been stuck in an endless loop of harsh Covid Zero curbs amid the worst outbreak since the start of the pandemic.

Authorities plan to push shots harder in places like nursing centres, while making those unwilling to get inoculated provide a reason for their refusal, said the National Health Commission on Tuesday (Nov 29). The government will use big data to identify elderly people who need the vaccine, the commission said.

While more than 90 per cent of China’s 1.4 billion people have been vaccinated with two shots – a relatively high percentage globally – the numbers decline with age. Only 65.7 per cent of over 80-year-olds are fully vaccinated, and just 40 per cent have received booster shots. About 86 per cent of those aged 60 and above have completed two shots.

Like the rest of the world, the low elderly vaccination rate is viewed as a roadblock to opening up. Authorities fear that mass infection among unprotected seniors could overwhelm the nation’s healthcare infrastructure. Yet, they have not done enough to persuade the vulnerable group to come forward for inoculation. While cash incentives and insurance for “vaccine accidents” have been offered by local officials to dispel hesitancy, the central government has forbidden the use of mandates, which have been effective in raising vaccine coverage in other countries.

China’s Covid Zero policy has increasingly come under pressure, with protests against the punishing regime erupting in cities from Beijing to Shanghai and Chengdu, to the far western outpost of Kashgar. Frustrated citizens took to the streets last weekend, urging an end to the curbs. Besides bringing misery to tens of millions of people across the country, the restrictions have also disrupted businesses and slowed growth in the world’s second-largest economy. BLOOMBERG