Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Bidens chief medical adviser, warned about the risks of Chinas planned retreat from its zero COVID policyand reiterated that the pandemic isnt over.
On Wednesday, China eased some of its quarantine requirements in a move away from its zero COVID policy that has, at times, included lockdowns of major cities. The move comes after anti-government protests that erupted throughout China over the strict anti-COVID measures.
But to reopen without the widespread adoption of vaccines particularly western vaccines that are considered more effective than Beijingswould be a huge risk, Fauci said.
If they dont do things like mount and implement a proactive vaccination campaign, and you open up, you are going to have a wave of infections which are certainly going to be associated with a certain degree of severity of disease, Fauci told the Financial Times Global Boardroom conference on Wednesday.
Experts previously told Fortune that because of Chinas zero COVID approach, its population has limited immunity from infection due to an overall lack of exposure. That coupled with low vaccination rates among its older residents and less effective vaccinesas Fauci saidcould trigger a huge wave of infections.
If that happens, theres an increased chance of mutations, Fauci said, that could create new variants. New variants can sometimes spread more quickly than the original virus, as seen with Omicron.
Whenever you have a large wave of transmissions of a virus, you give it ample opportunity to mutate, he said. And when you give a virus opportunity to mutate, that allows it to form potentially new variants. And once you get a brand new variant that could have an impact on the rest of the world.
Still Fauci said that Chinas strategy was flawed from the beginning because the country didnt use its lockdowns to vaccinate its population. In an interview with the Washington Post last week, Fauci said policies like Chinas zero COVID should come with an end game and a purpose.
In the era of vaccination, you might want to restrict until you can get your population in totality vaccinated, particularly the highly vulnerable elderly individuals, but as it turned out, thats not what happened, he said. The vaccination of the elderly has not been well performed, and the vaccine they have has been not a particularly effective vaccine.
Fauci advised that Chinas citizens be given more effective vaccines.
I would suggest that they import western ones, particularly the highly effective mRNA vaccines that are used in most countries in the world, he said. Unfortunately, the original Chinese vaccines did not have the level of efficacy of some of the other vaccines.
Our new weekly Impact Report newsletter examines how ESG news and trends are shaping the roles and responsibilities of todays executives. Subscribe here.
