IMost high-rise buildings in Beijing are now posting notes urging residents between the ages of 18 and 59 to get vaccinated. Some who don’t get a friendly call from the neighborhood committee. But there is no compulsory vaccination. China is only pushing its vaccination campaign at half speed. The internal requirement to have administered 50 million doses by the Spring Festival two weeks ago has not yet been achieved. According to the Bloomberg agency, only 40 million syringes have been used so far. This is remarkable in a country that seldom admits to having missed its goals.
China is far slower than the United States in the race for herd immunity. According to Bloomberg’s vaccination tracker, the People’s Republic has only provided 2.89 people per 100 inhabitants with at least one can of vaccine. America has 20 out of 100. If Beijing keeps the pace, it won’t achieve herd immunity until the end of 2022.
In the meantime, these findings seemed to arouse nervousness in Beijing. At the end of January the party newspaper “Global Times” warned: “Only if China’s vaccination rates keep roughly pace with those in America and Europe can China continue to lead and continue to make the greatest contribution to the recovery of the global economy.” must be high on the list of herd immunity ”. Otherwise, the country will only be able to open its borders much later and lose the lead it has achieved by successfully containing the virus. This is “a new test for China,” warned the newspaper.
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However, there is little sense of hectic in Beijing. Instead of pressing ahead with the campaign in their own country with the usual uncompromising attitude, there are daily reports on new vaccine deliveries abroad. It seems more important to Beijing at the moment to position itself as a helper in need and a global vaccine supplier. There is no audible criticism of this in the population.
Local disease control authorities report unusually frankly that many Chinese show little interest in getting vaccinated. In Shanghai and Zhejiang this is only around half of the residents, according to surveys. In the case of medical staff and health department employees in Zhejiang, it was only 42 percent. One reason for the reluctance is probably a lack of confidence in the preparations developed in a hurry. To date, none of the Chinese manufacturers has published extensive data and subjected them to review by independent experts in a specialist journal.
Low effectiveness as the real reason?
What is more important, however, is that the official infection rates in China are almost zero, so that the population feels that vaccination is not very urgent. The authorities are in no hurry to advance the approval of vaccines for older populations who have not yet had access to vaccine. The same vaccine that is given to 80-year-olds in Turkey, for example, may not be given to older people in China.
The lack of haste probably also has to do with the fact that, according to official information, the preparations are only effective for six months. Hardly anyone assumes that China will continue to open its borders to newcomers by then. It is unclear whether the vaccines will help against the new mutants. The comparatively low effectiveness of the Sinovac vaccine of just over 50 percent also makes the goal of herd immunity a long way off.
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