The Covid pandemic prompted a number of companies that had relied on Chinese manufacturers to start diversifying their supply chains by seeking alternatives in other countries.

He added: "Separate from geopolitical tensions, foreign business has lost much faith in Beijing's ability to manage the business environment and economy, ranging from an unworkable reaction to the pandemic by putting into place unreasonable restrictions that adversely affected supply chains, an environment where an emphasis on national security overrides common sense, and an inability to address downward trends in China's economy such as the real property meltdown that remains in free fall."

The quote represents how Chinese “unreasonable” covid policies lead to distrust in the government. Business-people leave the country to avoid possible economic issues.

Also portrays the ill economic conditions prior to COVID-19 epidemic. Although it could have been caused by peoples distrust in china, not only the far-fetched restrictions and limitations.

In its tightly sealed, meticulously managed Olympic bubble, the ubiquitous face masks, endless spraying of disinfectant and rigorous daily testing paid-off. Any infected visitors arriving in the country were swiftly identified and their cases contained, allowing the Winter Olympics to run largely free of Covid even as the Omicron variant raged around the world.

The success added to the party’s narrative that its political system is superior to those of Western democracies in handling the pandemic – a message Xi had repeatedly driven home as he prepared for a third term in power. It also boosted China’s confidence that its well-honed zero-Covid playbook of lockdowns, quarantines, mass testing and contact tracing could build an effective defense against highly transmissible Omicron and contain its spread. In the lead-up to the Games, these measures worked in January to tame the country’s first Omicron outbreak in Tianjin, a port city near Beijing.

As seen in the quote “ubiquitous face masks, endless spraying of disinfectant and rigorous daily testing paid-off. Any infected visitors arriving in the country were swiftly identified and their cases contained, allowing the Winter Olympics to run largely free of Covid even as the Omicron variant raged around the world.” we see how China’s policies pay off and allow success with containing the Omicron variant during one of the worlds most renowned and well-known events. This showed the foreign public that China’s policies were working.

Another pay of the excerpt is “added to the party’s narrative that its political system is superior to those of Western democracies in handling the pandemic”. This shows how the country’s policies led to a sense of relief and support from the Chinese public to the government. It gave extra support to the leader and promoted him for a next term. This decreased protests that were occurring beforehand.

Under the guise of fighting the novel coronavirus, authorities in China have escalated suppression online by blocking independent reporting, information sharing, and critical comments on government responses. Aggressive cyber policing and invasive online surveillance have played a key role in the initial government cover-up of the outbreak and hampering vital information flow, contributing to significant delay of emergency responses and loss of life. 

As said in this site, China had increased surveillance and “draconian” laws. As well as foreign racism scapegoating.

The source argues that China’s policies were unnecessary and were not directed at the public’s well-being, but rather at the world-wide public perception and implementing more Chinese government power over the citizens.

The source also highlights disappearances of controversial journalist and people with varying beliefs from the Chinese government.

Overall, the source explains how China used covid as a way to gain greater control over the people and burn the government beliefs into the people.

Confirmed

4,903,524

Death

101,056

Case Fatality

2.1%

Deaths per 100k population

7.16

The visible difference in the COVID rates between both societies is extremely large. The population to death ratio represents how the Policies were successful, even though they had slight breaches of human rights and were somewhat uncomfortable.

China does have censored information, this information could have been altered by the Chinese government

In response to the call, the majority of provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions in mainland China pushed back the spring semester start date and transitioned to teaching classes online.

From April 2020, on-campus teaching began to gradually re-open for school students, starting with graduating classes in high schools (Years 9 and 12, as well as graduating classes of secondary vocational schools).[3] By 11 May, all mainland provinces/municipalities and autonomous regions had recommenced on-campus teaching for senior high schools and 26 permitted students back on campus in higher education institutions –  meaning around 107.79 million students (~39% of China’s student population from kindergarten, primary and secondary school and higher education institutions) had returned to campus. [4]

Despite Chinese strict conditions with the Zero Covid Policy, they swiftly re-opened schools for the sake of their future generations.

In the second highlighted section of the excerpt, we see how China re-opened schools, beginning with the older graduating high school classes. This represents China’s understanding and empathy. It shows how China was not completely obsessed with just controlling people in their houses and actually had a drive to make life better.

Comparing once again to the USA, China opened schools in April 2020, which is way before USA per anatomy re-opened schools.

China remains a large, growing market with a vast opportunity set. But as China reopens and its economy recovers, the country’s next chapter is set to look a lot different than the last. This means investors cannot rely on their existing game plan. As the long-term trends in China shift, it is important to see the change, understand the change, and continue to look forward. We believe investors will need to take a more nuanced view of public market exposures and add thoughtful idiosyncratic exposure to private markets with managers able to identify and execute in thematic areas with structural tailwinds. This could make portfolios more resilient as China enters its next chapter.

During China’s Lunar New Year Golden Week (January 21-27), movie box office revenues, postal package delivery, and restaurant sales all exceeded 2019 levels. There was also a V-shaped recovery of domestic air traffic and booming hotel demand.

As stated by one of the most renowned companies in the field of economics, Goldman Sachs, China is set to rebound from their economic dip during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Through stock market trends to consumer predictions China is set to make even MORE money than it was originally.

The conference that took place to revitalize policies did end the zero-COVID policy. This represents China’s ability to understand the world around them and that they KNOW what is best for their people, otherwise they would have kept a lock-down. China’s re-opening success not only improved China’s economy but the economy on a global scale.

The happiness index of 5.19 points in 2019, which was in the lower 50 percentile, did not seem to correlate with any of the usual suspects: the GDP growth, pollution levels, corruption or the perception of it, or even income inequality. The possible factors that could have affected people’s happiness were unemployment, insufficient social safety net, and several political issues such as tightened censorship and ongoing protest in Hong Kong. However, the country saw a surge in the sense of happiness in 2021 and 2022. Successful containment of the COVID-19 pandemic that gave a greater feeling of security, fast economic recovery, and increase in the national pride could have been a few of the reasons behind the recent rising optimism in China.

Chinese happiness clearly spiked through the effects of the zero-covid policy. Chinese approach led to an economic rebound, leaving citizens with a better feeling about the whole situation. This statistic proves China’s approach WAS appropriate because it increased citizen satisfaction and happiness.