The city of Dalian in the mainland announced that from May 17, the nationwide normalized nucleic acid test will be carried out. All men will be tested for sex on Tuesday, and all women will be tested on Thursday, which is equivalent to two tests per family per week. This is more economical and more effective prevention. The method of spreading the Omicron variant virus is also a national risk warning mechanism.
The mainland is indeed taking a scientific attitude, constantly learning, and constantly transforming to deal with the new crown epidemic. Due to the strong infectivity of the Omicron variant virus, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Shanghai and Beijing, the four major first-tier cities in China, have broken defenses successively. Shenzhen and Guangzhou responded quickly and brought the disease under control at an early stage, while Shanghai responded more slowly with a severe outbreak that was brought under control now, while Beijing is still trying to control the epidemic.
In the face of Omicron’s high infectivity and the sound of the Western world lying flat, the country had to make a choice between two paths: one is to follow the West and immediately coexist with the virus at this stage; the other is to continue to “dynamically clear”. The country finally confirmed to continue “dynamic clearing”.
In the face of a rapidly spreading virus like Omicron, it is impossible to completely cut off all input cases. How can we achieve “dynamic clearing”? It turns out that the country has begun to test a new method to normalize nucleic acid testing, and conduct regular testing of all employees in various cities, such as regular scanning for local community infections.
Taking the method of Dalian City as an example, the whole population is divided into males and females (each accounts for half of the population), and each person is tested once a week, which means that everyone is tested once a week and 52 times a year. Find hidden communicators. If there is an outbreak in some areas of the city, it can be changed to a test on the 3rd, a test on the 2nd, or even every day, and respond accordingly.
The mainland ensures that all residents are tested according to the instructions, mainly relying on the test code of the health code. After each test, the tester will get a test green code, and can freely enter and leave public places. Those who do not do the test as scheduled, the green code will become With the yellow code, many places cannot be reached, which ensures that citizens will abide by the testing regulations and do regular testing.
In addition, the central government instructs cities to set up a large number of “15-minute testing circles”, so that residents can reach the testing station within 15 minutes’ walking time, reducing the inconvenience of citizens doing testing.
There are several aspects worth discussing in this normalized full-staff detection of new thinking:
The first is cost. Western estimates of the cost of national testing for the country vary. Nomura Securities estimates that the cost of each test is 20 yuan, and 70% of the population is tested every 48 hours, which is regarding 8.4% of China’s total fiscal expenditure or 1.8% of GDP. %. But I believe that Nomura’s figure is far overestimated, because the constant cost of large-scale testing in the mainland does not need to be 20 yuan each. With Dalian’s method, all employees are tested once a week, and the cost will be much lower than Nomura’s forecast.
Goldman Sachs estimates that China’s national testing will only account for 0.2% of China’s GDP in the second half of the year. If Goldman Sachs’ forecasts are accurate and the country’s national testing is normalized, the chances of needing to be locked down can be greatly reduced, and the cost of regular national testing will be far lower than that of the outbreak;
The second is the immeasurable cost of human life. Regular nationwide testing can prevent outbreaks. If an epidemic breaks out, there will be a cost in human life. The fifth wave of the epidemic in Hong Kong killed more than 9,100 people. If the same situation happened in the mainland, 1.73 million lives would be lost. Such a huge casualty cannot be measured by economic figures. Normalized nationwide nucleic acid testing can prevent outbreaks and is the safest method.
The third is to reduce the “long new crown” disaster. It is an iron-clad fact that some patients who have been infected with the new coronavirus will have long-term sequelae. Patients will experience severe fatigue, loss of taste, brain defects and sexual dysfunction, and other so-called “coronavirus” symptoms. Different countries and regions estimate that the number of people suffering from the “long-term new crown” is different. The long-term new crown accounts for 2% of the number of people infected with the new crown. If half of China’s population, that is, 700 million people are infected with the new crown epidemic, 2% is equal to 14 million people. Chronically ill, the nation’s workforce will decline, at a staggering price. Some people in the UK once said that the elderly who died from the new crown saved social expenses. In the UK, 170,000 people died due to the new crown, but 250,000 people suffered from the new crown. They thought that the death of the new crown reduced medical expenses.
Therefore, China’s implementation of normalized nationwide nucleic acid testing has more advantages than disadvantages. If an effective “dynamic clearing” of Omicron virus transmission can be tested, the next step can be to shorten the entry quarantine time from 21 to 14 or even 7 days, which can further reduce the social cost of epidemic control. Hong Kong should also consider whether it can conduct normalized nationwide nucleic acid testing.
Lu Yongxiong
