Passenger numbers on Shanghai’s subway are rapidly returning to levels seen before the latest Covid wave, according to Wind data. Pictured here are subway cars in the city on January 4, 2023.
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BEIJING—Macquarie chief China economist Larry Hu said China could likely be able to coexist with Covid-19 by the end of March, based on how quickly people returned to the streets.
Metro and road data show traffic in major cities is recovering, indicating that the worst wave of the latest coronavirus outbreak has passed, he said.
“A dramatic U-turn in China’s Covid policy since mid-November means a deeper short-term economic contraction but a quicker reopening and recovery,” Hu said in a report on Wednesday. rice field. “There is potential for a strong economic recovery in the spring.”
In recent days, the southern city of Guangzhou and the tourist city of Sanya said they had passed the peak of the coronavirus wave.
Health officials in Chongqing said Tuesday that daily visitors to a major fever clinic were just over 3,000, down sharply from December 16, when the number of cases topped 30,000. The state-level region has a population of about 32 million.
Chongqing was mainland China’s busiest city during Thursday morning rush hour, according to Baidu traffic data. The figures show an increase in traffic from the week before him in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and other major cities.
As of Wednesday, subway ridership in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou had risen significantly from lows in recent weeks, but had only recovered to about two-thirds of last year’s levels, according to Wind Information. not.
Caixin’s monthly survey of services businesses in December was the most optimistic in about a year and a half, according to Thursday’s release. The seasonally adjusted business activity index rose to 48 in December from his half-year low of 46.7 in November.
A figure below 50 still indicates a reduction in business activity. Another Caixin manufacturers survey index fell to 49 in December from 49.4 in November. Their optimism was the highest he had been in ten months.
Poorer rural areas next
Medical researchers in Shanghai say the latest wave of Covid will pass through major Chinese cities by the end of 2022, while rural areas and more remote provinces in central and western China will be hit with infections in mid-to-late January. predicted in the study.
“The duration and magnitude of future outbreaks could be dramatically enhanced by mass travel during the Chinese New Year (January 21, 2023),” the researchers wrote in a journal sponsored by the Chinese medical school. said in a paper published in late December by the Frontiers of Medicine. education.
Hundreds of millions of people typically travel during the holiday also known as the Chinese New Year.
Elderly people living in remote areas of China, especially those with underlying medical conditions, face serious illness risks from the highly contagious omicron variant, researchers say. The authors were particularly concerned about the shortage of medical care and intensive care units in rural areas.
Even before the pandemic, China’s public health system was expanding. People across the country frequented the overcrowded hospitals in the capital, Beijing, for better medical care than they had in their hometowns.
Louise Lu, senior economist at Oxford Economics, remains wary of China’s rapid recovery.
“The normalization of economic activity will take some time, especially the need to change public perceptions of COVID-19 transmission and vaccine effectiveness,” Lu said in a report on Wednesday.
The company expects China’s GDP to grow by 4.2% in 2023.
lingering long-term risk
The medical researchers also warned of the risk that an outbreak of Omicron on the mainland “could emerge in multiple waves” and that a new surge of infections could occur in the second half of 2023. The months and years ahead should not be overestimated.”
But in a lack of timely information, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday China calls for ‘faster, regular and reliable data’ About hospitalizations and deaths, and more comprehensive real-time viral sequencing. ”
In early December, China abruptly ended many of the draconian Covid restrictions that restricted business and social activities. On Sunday, the country will officially end quarantine requirements for inbound travelers, restoring the ability of Chinese citizens to travel abroad for leisure. imposed strict border controls.
