With the renaming of COVID-19 to new coronavirus infection, Category B and B, and the successive relaxation of domestic and foreign controls, the "Chinese-style epidemic prevention" that lasted for nearly three years has come to an end. However, the epidemic has not ended. Many places, including Shanghai, are experiencing an "epidemic tsunami" after liberalization...
Looking back on the three-year "Chinese-style epidemic prevention" process that is about to come to an end, what fallacies have we experienced?
1. Cognitive fallacy: In cognitive awareness, epidemic prevention is regarded as a quick and decisive war to stop and defend the country, rather than a war of attrition or a protracted war. Based on this understanding, a general policy of dynamic clearing "0" has been formulated to guide long-term epidemic prevention work. In the nearly a year since the outbreak of the Omicron strain , the implementation of this general policy has become increasingly inefficient, high-cost, and full of secondary problems, until it finally went bankrupt.
2. Decision-making fallacy: Epidemic prevention decisions are made one-size-fits-all and turned 180 degrees overnight, and the timing of decision-making conflicts with the actual situation. From insisting on long-term isolation and control as the main means of clearing "zero" to fully liberalizing in a 180-degree turn, the interval is only a few days, there is no transition period, and the reserves of drugs and medical resources are insufficient. The timing of liberalization coincides with the coming of winter and the Spring Festival. For a country with such a large population like China, how could such an abrupt decision be made hastily? Have you considered the impact on grassroots and vulnerable groups?
3. System fallacy: The high-level decision-making system relies heavily on a team of public health system experts from a small circle. This system itself is fragile, because the small circle team may be a group of people with the same group or similar personal interests. Can the voices they convey ensure absolute objectivity and science? Recall that in March this year, when the epidemic broke out in Shanghai, Wu Fan, a public health and epidemic prevention expert, once pointed out that Shanghai cannot be closed because Shanghai is China's economic and financial center, and there are nearly 10,000 foreign ships at the Yangtze River estuary that are about to enter the port... Her voice was quickly suppressed, and Shanghai also began a nearly three-month lockdown. In the face of today's comprehensive liberalization and "yang" everywhere, this experience is so ironic and ridiculous... For China, the way to prevent the fallacy of the system is to open up the air, allow and listen to the voices representing different groups, and make scientific decisions comprehensively and rigorously;
4. Professional fallacy: The public health and epidemic prevention departments represented by the National Health Commission and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, from their lagging performance when the Wuhan epidemic broke out at the end of 2019 to their fueling of the dynamic "0" process in the past year, have all reflected their lack of a pragmatic scientific attitude and serious and rigorous professionalism, and their outstanding "official-oriented" style. I believe that the top management has been led astray and disrupted by the professional bureaucrats involved for a long time... I won’t talk about the far-off things, but the recent ones are such as "The symptoms of Omicron are very mild, and more than 90% of people are asymptomatic", "Traditional Chinese medicine is effective in treating COVID-19", "Imported vaccines, imported drug conspiracy theories" and so on. It is a huge country, but it is difficult to see one or two professional leaders who "live and die for the benefit of the country, and do not avoid it because of misfortunes and blessings." What we see are just a few parrots who adapt to the situation and change their words...
5. Capability fallacy: The solution to the new coronavirus lies in effective vaccines, effective drugs, a complete epidemic monitoring system, and a complete hierarchical public health service system. In the past three years, a large amount of energy, finance and resources have been concentrated on inefficient and low-quality measures such as virus testing, shelter construction, isolation and containment, while little progress has been made in areas that really need to improve capabilities. There is also a group of people with ulterior motives around us who promote patriotism and conspiracy theories. They turn a blind eye to better vaccines and drugs from abroad and even openly slander them, trying to go all the way...
In summary. The three-year epidemic has not been a matter where one can simply use "how many people died for you and how many people died for me" as a comparison to cover up one's own mistakes. Moreover, our National Health Commission has given up on epidemic data statistics, and how many people believe the data they compiled?
