Hearses queue at Beijing crematorium, even as China reports no new Covid deaths
DOZENS of hearses queued outside a Beijing crematorium on Wednesday (Dec 21), even as China reported no new Covid-19 deaths in its growing outbreak, sparking criticism of its virus accounting as the capital braces for a surge of cases.
Following widespread protests, the country of 1.4 billion people this month began dismantling its unpopular “zero-Covid” regime of lockdowns and testing that had largely kept the virus under control for three years, though at great economic and psychological cost.
The abrupt change of policy has caught a fragile health system unprepared and hospitals are scrambling for beds and blood, pharmacies for drugs, and authorities are racing to build special clinics. Experts predict China could face more than a million Covid deaths next year.
At a crematorium in Beijing’s Tongzhou district, a Reuters witness saw a queue of about 40 hearses waiting to enter while the parking lot was full.
Inside, family and friends, many wearing traditional white clothing and headbands of mourning, gathered around about 20 coffins awaiting cremation. Staff wore hazmat suits and smoke rose from five of the 15 furnaces.
There was a heavy police presence outside the crematorium.
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Reuters could not verify whether the deaths were caused by Covid.
The death toll might rise sharply in the near future, with the state-run Global Times newspaper citing a Chinese respiratory expert predicting a spike in severe cases in Beijing over the coming weeks.
“We must act quickly and prepare fever clinics, emergency and severe treatment resources,” Wang Guangfa, a respiratory specialist from Peking University First Hospital, told the newspaper.
Wang expected the Covid wave to peak in late January, with life likely to return to normal by late February or early March.
The NHC also played down international concern about the possibility of virus mutations, saying the likelihood of new strains that are more pathogenic was low.
Paul Tambyah, President of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection, supported that view.
“I do not think that this is a threat to the world,” he said. “The chances are that the virus will behave like every other human virus and adapt to the environment in which it circulates by becoming more transmissible and less virulent.” REUTERS
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