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COVID-19

Society
Tapati Guha Thakurta

Time To "Move On" From COVID? That's Not An Option For Me

Anger depletes and debilitates; grief, on the other hand, creates a new strength and resolve. What is centrally at stake for me, three years after I lost my husband, is a stubborn refusal to forget the disease that took him away.

-Essay-

NEW DELHI — Three years ago, it was during the last days in April that the season’s first Kalbaishakhi – gusts of thunder, storm and rain – broke into the sultry summer evening in Kolkata, just as it did this year. I remember the rains came late on that Sunday evening at the end of April 2020, stopping what had become our routine walk during that hour.

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This Happened

This Happened—January 23: The First COVID Lockdown

On this day three years ago, the Chinese government imposed a lockdown in Wuhan in what marked the unofficial beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Coronavirus
Xian Zhu and Feiyu Xiang

As COVID Explodes, An Inside Look At China's Gray Market Of Generic Drugs

COVID infections have skyrocketed since China eased restrictions as public health policy has not been able to keep up. Unable to find medications, many have turned to generic drugs of questionable safety. It's the culmination of a longstanding problem.

BEIJING — When her grandfather joined the millions of infected Chinese, Chen quickly decided to buy COVID-19 drugs to limit the effects of the virus. She woke up early to shop on Jingdong, one of China’s biggest online shopping websites, but failed in snatching the limited daily stocks made available.

Fearing COVID's effect on her grandfather, who suffers from dementia, she contacted an independent drug agent and bought a box of generic pharmaceuticals.

With China having suddenly ended its zero-COVID policy, infections have peaked. According to the latest estimates by Airfinity, a British medical information and analysis company, severe COVID outbreaks happened over Chinese New Year with 62 million infections forecast for the second half of January.

In a press conference held by China's State Council on Jan. 11, COVID-19 pills were mentioned as part of the new epidemic control mechanisms. In late 2021, Pfizer developed Paxlovid, the world's first potent COVID drug, with one 100 mg white ritonavir and two 150 mg light pink nirmatrelvir tablets taken every 12 hours. China imported the first batch of Paxlovid for clinical use in March 2022 and included it in the ninth edition of the treatment protocol.

But the first 21,200 boxes of Paxlovid were dispersed to only eight provinces, and no further information is available on where the drug ended up and how much it was used.

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Coronavirus
Duncan Robertson

Why Making COVID Predictions Is Actually Getting Harder

We know more about COVID than ever before, but that doesn't make it easier to predict what will happen this year. It also remains to be seen if we'll put the lessons we learned into practice.

In 2020, we knew very little about the novel virus that was to become known as COVID-19. Now, as we enter 2023, a search of Google Scholar produces around five million results containing the term.

So how will the pandemic be felt in 2023? This question is in some ways impossible to answer, given a number of unknowns. In early 2020, the scientific community was focused on determining key parameters that could be used to make projections as to the severity and extent of the spread of the virus. Now, the complex interplay of COVID variants, vaccination and natural immunity makes that process far more difficult and less predictable.

But this doesn’t mean there’s room for complacency. The proportion of people estimated to be infected has varied over time, but this figure has not fallen below 1.25% (or one in 80 people) in England for the entirety of 2022. COVID is very much still with us, and people are being infected time and time again.

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Ideas
Pierre Haski

China's COVID Coverup Is The Perfect Script For One-Party Rule

That it fools nobody is essential to the plot. That people are dying turns it into tragedy.

-Analysis-

Rarely has the gap between official information and reality been so wide. Every night at 8 p.m., China's newscast opens with a long montage devoted to the daily activities of the country's leaders, by order of importance: Xi Jinping at an economic meeting, Xi Jinping publishing a new book ... Then, after 20 minutes or so, some images about COVID, just in passing, and mainly to highlight that the Party line is the right one.

Among the Chinese population, it is exactly the opposite. COVID dominates conversations: the race for drugs, saturated hospitals with beds set up outside, endless waits at crematoriums working non-stop. And death, with the number of pandemic casualties unknown since the government has changed the definition of what constitutes a COVID victim.

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In The News
Emma Albright, Laure Gautherin, Sophie Jacquier, Marine Béguin and Anne-Sophie Goninet

Drones On Moscow, Maduro Back In Brazil, Cheese Race Win By KO

👋 Lasso fyafulla!*

Welcome to Tuesday, where two people were injured as Moscow has been targeted by another drone attack, Venezuela’s President Maduro is welcomed back in Brazil for the first time since 2019, and a woman wins UK’s annual cheese race by knockout. Meanwhile, Joanna Wisniowska in Warsaw-based daily Gazeta Wyborcza writes that Poland may have been a little too successful at safeguarding its moose population …

[*Tamang, Nepal]

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Economy
Vibhav Mariwala

Post-Pandemic Reflections On The Accumulation Of State Power

The public sector has seen a revival in response to COVID-19. This can be a good thing, but must be checked carefully because history tells us of the risks of too much control in the government's hands.

-Analysis-

NEW DELHI — The COVID-19 pandemic marked the beginning of a period of heightened global tensions, social and economic upheaval and of a sustained increase in state intervention in the economy. Consequently, the state has acquired significant powers in managing people’s personal lives, starting from lockdowns and quarantine measures, to providing stimulus and furlough schemes, and now, the regulation of energy consumption.

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Coronavirus
Emma Albright

Masks And Me: Take This Pandemic Story At Face Value

Even if COVID cases are rising again, the author isn't ready to mask up again. But she's also not quite ready to say goodbye forever...

-Essay-

PARIS — Waiting in line at the pharmacy the other day, I heard a customer ask for a COVID-19 test. The pharmacist let out a long sarcastic sigh: “We’re still doing those?”

Of course they are, as cases are again rising ahead of winter here in France and many other places around the world. But the true sign of the depth of our collective COVID fatigue were the masks at the pharmacy. That is, there were none, not even the pharmacist was wearing one, even if a sign hangs in front saying they’re required.

The regular announcements that have begun airing again on French radio about the importance of masks in containing the virus sound beside the point. Indeed, wearing masks is no longer a requirement anywhere in France, merely a suggestion.

Still, masks have by no means gone away, either in society, or my mind. That becomes clearest when I’m riding the metro in Paris. As I count the ratio of masked to non-masked, and hear the daily announcements on the benefits of wearing one, a dilemma starts to creep in…

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Coronavirus
Yi Dong, Ren Yang

Escape From Foxconn: Inside The COVID Lockdown Chaos Blocking China's iPhone Production

Around China, Zero COVID policy has shut down entire towns and workplaces. But in the high-tech Foxconn factory in Zhengzhou, famous for cranking out iPhones, employees were forced to work even if they tested positive. Exclusive testimony from some of those who fled Foxconn premises last week.

ZHENGZHOU — Luo, a newcomer at the Foxconn factory in this central Chinese city, was genuinely frightened when she heard her workplace would be an "experiment field" for new COVID-19 policies: Even during outbreaks, some employees won't stop their production work. Luo was chosen as one of the experiment subjects.

By the end of October, things were getting out of control at Foxconn: chaotic COVID testings, spreading infections, workers quitting their jobs. And Luo felt trapped inside the five million square meters of the Foxconn factory, China's largest producer of Apple's iPhones, which was falsely described as a COVID-free zone.

On Oct. 29, videos of Foxconn workers returning by foot to their hometowns began to spread on the internet. Some workers claimed that due to the company's chaotic quarantine system and poor logistical support, they had chosen to leave on their own and walk for several days back to small towns outside the city.

It would only deepen the delays piling up for iPhone deliveries around the world, and raise new questions about China's policy for dealing with the spread of COVID.

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Coronavirus
Deng Yuwen

Xi's Burden — Why China Is Sticking With Zero COVID

Too much has been put in to the state-sponsored truth that minimal spread of the virus is the at-all-cost objective. Xi Jinping may eventually have no choice but to renounce the harsh measures, but at this week's Communist Party Congress, the Chinese President was giving no ground.

This article was updated on Oct. 17 at 10:45 a.m. EST

The tragic bus accident in Guiyang last month — in which 27 people being sent to quarantine were killed — was one of the worst examples of collateral damage since the COVID-19 pandemic began in China nearly three years ago. While the crash can ultimately be traced back to bad government policy, the local authorities did not register it as a Zero COVID related casualty. It was, for them, a simple traffic accident.

The officials in the southern Chinese province of Guizhou, of course, had no alternative. Drawing a link between the deadly crash and the strict policy of Zero COVID, touted by President Xi Jinping, would have revealed the absurdity of the government's choices.

At a speech Sunday to open this week's historic Communist Party Congress, Xi made clear he had no immediate plans to loosen the Zero-Covid strategy. He called the tough health measures, a "people's war to stop the spread of the virus."

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Society
Katja Ridderbusch

Talking Risks: New Research Finds Psychotherapy Can Have Dangerous Side Effects

It has long been assumed that psychotherapy can do no harm at worst. But new research makes clear that for some people, it can have very serious, even life-threatening, consequences.

BERLIN — Until now, we have assumed that, at worst, psychotherapy has no impact whatsoever. However, new research shows that treatment can have serious risks. A few patients experience side effects — and sometimes even an increase in mental health problems.

Across Europe and the United States, experts and politicians alike are concerned that people’s mental health is suffering. Massimiliano Mascherini from Eurofound, the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, has even said we are experiencing a “parallel pandemic in mental health”. U.S. President Joe Biden recently announced that mental health was one of his top priorities and his government would provide $300 million of funding for mental health and community projects.

Why? Well, one in five people in the U.S. has mental health problems. According to data from the Robert Koch Institute, even before the pandemic hit, one in 10 women and 8.1% of men in Germany were seeing a psychologist or psychiatrist.

The coronavirus crisis has made matters worse. According to data from the World Health Organization, since the start of the pandemic, the number of people diagnosed with anxiety and depression has risen by 25%. As a result, more people are seeking professional help.

“Even after three years of the pandemic, the demand for psychotherapy remains high,” says Gebhard Hentschel, president of the German Psychotherapists Association. In summer 2022, the number of patients seeking therapy was still around 40% higher than before COVID, which means waiting lists at practices and clinics are also long.

So far the biggest issue has been the lack of provision. But research is starting to highlight another problem that until now has gone under the radar: psychotherapy, just like other medical interventions, comes with its own risks. “Around 10% of psychotherapy patients experience serious and long-lasting side effects,” says Michael Linden, a neurologist, psychiatrist and psychotherapist at the Charité Hospital in Berlin.

Some patients even develop new, more serious anxieties, become dependent on their psychotherapists or experience a breakdown in relationships with family and friends. They end up in a worse situation than before, and in rare cases, therapy even ends in suicide.

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In The News
Renate Mattar, Emma Albright, Inès Mermat, Hugo Perrin and Anne-Sophie Goninet

“Reckless” Russia In Drone Crash, Pakistan’s Khan Protests, Introducing GPT-4

👋 Demat !*

Welcome to Wednesday, where a Russian fighter jet collides with U.S. drone over the Black Sea, Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan resists arrest, and there’s already a new ChatGPT to talk to. Meanwhile, Roman Kravets and Roman Romanyuk for Ukrainian news website Ukrainska Pravda look back on Putin’s original plans to take over Ukraine, and what foiled them.

[*Breton, France]

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