Ignoring experts, China's sudden zero-COVID exit cost lives

And that folks is a basic a summary of what happened. Makes me sick reading it

But in reality, China’s ruling Communist Party ignored repeated efforts by top medical experts to kickstart exit plans until it was too late, The Associated Press has found.

I just don't get how people at all levels of society in all countries refuse to listen to experts.

China is a mess. And it doesn't seem to be getting any better whatsoever.

At the end the experts at the WHO and other international public health authorities were right and the Chinese government wrong. the zero covid policy was unsustainable and was costing lives unnecessarily, and pretending it could continue indefinitely instead of focusing on having a proper exit strategy caused a huge disaster and hundreds of thousands (at least) unnecessary deaths.

The whole pandemic has become an example of how China ignoring the best available scientific evidence causes irreversible damage to public health, both locally and globally. Corruption and prioritizing political gain over the health and lives of the people made the pandemic escape out of control at the beginning, and made uncountable people lose their lives unnecessarily towards the end.

The whole pandemic has become an example of how China ignoring...

Indeed. And it's not as if China made a few errors in judgement as it adjusted to what the pandemic demanded, like the WHO and the wrong advice it gave regarding masks. Back in March 2020:

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/03/30/world/coronavirus-who-masks-recommendation-trnd/index.html

Which it soon corrected:

https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public/when-and-how-to-use-masks

China's approach has been myopic, harking to a bygone fanatical age.

It can be safely said that since China pulled the plug on zero covid after the demonstrates that threaten domestic stability, the pandemic entered a different gear and downgraded itself.

China, its supports and others who have consistently gone against experts advice have definitely prolonged the suffering and grief of the pandemic.

As the dust settles, chickens are coming home to roost

like the WHO and the wrong advice it gave regarding masks. 

There is a huge difference between advice being wrong and being just not the best possible because of lack of information. The advice was the only one that any institution based on science could make, because there was no evidence to support another (and because masks were scarce, so there was merit in prioritizing them to the places where they actually had evidence-based efficacy). As soon as evidence was collected and the efficacy of their use by asymptomatic people in the general population proved the recommendation changed accordingly, nothing in that process can be called wrong.

The covid situation with China is the opposite, the best available evidence clearly indicated that any report of unusual outbreaks of respiratory diseases should be treated as an incipient pandemic, which was not done, guidelines made it a priority to make a full epidemiological survey and report everything to the authorities (including the WHO), instead the Chinese goverment hid everything they could. The same evidence proved the zero covid policy was inefficient, was causing unnecessary deaths and should have been replaced a long time ago with much better vaccination and support for the public health system, this was also ignored.

At the end every problem can be traced to ignoring the science and doing things for political profit, even when that means that countless people would lose their health, living means, rights and lives.

Chinese goverment hid everything they could

And spun things beyond recognition. The scary thing is, so many people believed them. I wonder why and if they were sincere or just making a bad situation worse out of spite??

When a group of countries set in their minds what countries will be designated as enemies, it does not matter what that country does, it will never be accepted as a good thing.

Interestingly it was the agency The Who that ignored experts.

In early 2020 the WHO tweeted that there was "no clear evidence" that the coronavirus could spread between people. Why did that agency make that remark? Because that's what China told them. Just one of the many mistakes the WHO made during the pandemic.

Another was the WHO agency ignoring experts who recommended wearing masks, with the result of millions of deaths in Australia, New Zealand, the UK, Europe, and the US, while countries in Asia that listened to the experts, such as Japan, Vietnam, and China, saved millions of lives.

Interestingly it was the agency The Who that ignored experts.

No it did not, that is still the misrepresentation you keep trying to push in every article where the WHO is mentioned.

Why did that agency make that remark? Because that's what China told them. Just one of the many mistakes the WHO made during the pandemic.

What mistake are you talking about, the only people that could offer any evidence of human to human transmission were the Chinese, and they refused to release that evidence, there is nothing anybody could say except that this evidence was not available, there is no "ignoring experts" as you claimed, just recognize that the only people that could offer any evidence were not doing it. Once again this falls completely on the Chinese government that choose to hide that information from the world.

Another was the WHO agency ignoring experts who recommended wearing masks

Still a false misrepresentation, the CDC, EMA, WHO, etc did not recommend wearing masks for asymtomatic people on the community simply because there was no evidence to support that recommendation.

while countries in Asia that listened to the experts, such as Japan, Vietnam, and China, saved millions of lives.

That has been demonstrated false every time you post it. For example the Japanese authorities clearly recommended for masks to be prioritized for hospitals, specially while there were extremely scarce at the beginning of the pandemic, why insist on something that have been proved false to you?

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20200207/k10012277301000.html

Statistics, number, data etc, can be interpreted in so many ways and forms, to suit your arguments, opinions, etc. The critical, most important statistics here is, the number of total deaths in each and every country, in per capital. End of story.

Here we have an actual global health organization (CDC) in the West following the Asian medical experts advice for the general public to wear masks, April 3, 2020:

https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-04-03/cdc-recommends-wearing-face-masks-during-coronavirus-pandemic

Here, the agency the WHO, in its continued providing of disarrayed information that contributed to millions of preventable deaths, is still saying masks are not needed for the general public, in April 2020:

https://archive.vn/L53sT

Looks like the medical experts in China, Japan, Singapore, Korea, Vietnam, who relied on studies on mask effectiveness against influenza, SARS (Covid and SARS are both coronavirus, so the logical step of course . . .) were months ahead of the "experts" in the West.

The CDC even used information from Singapore to support its conclusions, in the, CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

Looking back at this report, it just makes the WHO look so amateur:

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/30/world/coronavirus-who-masks-recommendation-trnd/index.html

Here we have an actual global health organization (CDC) in the West following the Asian medical experts advice for the general public to wear masks, April 3, 2020:

You understand that this completely disproves your claim, right? literally months after the beginning of the pandemic were necessary to actually get the evidence that made the CDC change their recommendations, which was the same every other organization (the CDC is not global, the WHO is, and the global authority designated by the UN even).

Precisely because a global authority requires global evidence is why a dealy of days is understandable to make a change of recommendations, compared with the literally months that it took the CDC to reach that decision that is a terribly short time.

Looks like the medical experts in China, Japan, Singapore, Korea, Vietnam, who relied on studies on mask effectiveness against influenza, SARS (Covid and SARS are both coronavirus, so the logical step of course . . .) were months ahead of the "experts" in the West.

The link already provided completely disproves your claim, not addressing it only demonstrate you already understand you are misrepresenting the actual authorities and presenting a false appeal to authority, the actual recommendation from the Japanese authorities (as in the reference) are in complete concordance with the same recommendations at the time by the CDC and WHO.

Looking back at this report, it just makes the WHO look so amateur:

No, it does not, it makes it look as a scientific authority that requires evidence supporting a recommendation as it should be.

Exactly the opposite of what China did, it had the evidence that proved its strategy was doomed to fail and cause uncountable deaths, it persisted with it against the recommendation of the experts and ended up as predicted, with hundreds of thousands dying because of it.

In April 2020

Three years ago. And the WHO is not what the article is about.

Back on topic, In October 2023 China was pushing ahead with zero covid policy until the protests. That was just stupid and against all advice.

Looks like the medical experts in China, Japan, Singapore, Korea, Vietnam, who relied on studies on mask effectiveness against influenza, SARS (Covid and SARS are both coronavirus, so the logical step of course . . .) were months ahead of the "experts" in the West.

The WHO took a beating for its mishandling of this.

https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-04-03/cdc-recommends-wearing-face-masks-during-coronavirus-pandemic

https://archive.vn/L53sT

These two studies show the WHO lagged behind the worldwide scientific consensus.

The irony--the virus came from China, but it was Asia that lead the world in taking the first preventive measures.

literally months after the beginning of the pandemic were necessary to actually get the evidence that made the CDC change their recommendations, which was the same every other organization (the CDC is not global,

No, it was literally days that medical experts in Asian countries advised wearing masks.

CDC experts even acknowledged the success of countries like Singapore and Taiwan.

China's dictator thinks he knows better than the scientists. The trouble with dictators, and would-be dictators, is that no one dares tell them they are wrong.

The WHO took a beating for its mishandling of this.

Again, the same as with the other account repeating the same thing that is false, making a personal claim and the pretending that is what the experts of the world are saying makes absolutely no sense.

These two studies show the WHO lagged behind the worldwide scientific consensus.

No, they don't, one explicitly refers to symptomatic people which means it actually supports the recomendation made by all the international public health authorities, the other is limited in scope and misses the necessary data to support the main conclusion, making it completely inadequate to guide a global recommendation.

These references have been already used by the other account and were refuted without problem, why then use them again with the same purpose when it has already been made clear they are not supporting that claim? is that that there are no reference either account can use to actually provide evidence?

No, it was literally days that medical experts in Asian countries advised wearing masks.

The quoted text refers clearly to the declaration of the CDC that changed it recommendations more than 4 months after the pandemic began. Also as the article provided clearly proves the recommenation made by the actual experts in countries like Japan is the same the CDC and WHO made, for masks to be prioritized for symptomatic patients in hospitals and not to asymptomatic people on the street.

The link is still the same

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20200207/k10012277301000.html

Just repeating the same false claim without refuting this source first does not make that claim less false, nor is making it with two accounts.

I feel sorry for the Chinese people.