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Speaker 1: So let's get over to our next guest. He's professor

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Speaker 1: and director of Center for Public Health Research at Nanjin

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Speaker 1: University Medical School. Professor Gi, thank you so much for

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Speaker 1: joining us. We obviously want to get your take on

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Speaker 1: the relaxation of COVID measures in China, as they mentioned

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Speaker 1: Shanghai Hang Joe now joining and relaxing the measures. What's

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Speaker 1: your judgment of what we've seen so far and what's

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Speaker 1: coming next? UM Well, I so far approximately that doesn't

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Speaker 1: see there have easing easily restrictions on COVID basically by

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Speaker 1: removing the requirement of pH new pa as testing and

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Speaker 1: sitting restaurant services, and also are the public health public activities.

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Speaker 1: I think a very good science and the country is

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Speaker 1: moving towards the opening up. But I don't see that

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Speaker 1: it's a will be immediately fully opening. It's more like

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Speaker 1: is that there is a UH for policy from formulation. Basically,

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Speaker 1: the government is trying to balance um the general public

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Speaker 1: and also those um UH elderly people and people with

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Speaker 1: basical medical conditions or to deal with that in case

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Speaker 1: when the infection shoots up. So I think there are

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Speaker 1: still certain kind of preparations for hospital services and also

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Speaker 1: public health sectors as well, so um, but overall I

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Speaker 1: would expect that the country is going to open up

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Speaker 1: a variation after three years of strict restrictions. People are

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Speaker 1: frustrated and we have things that you can really contain

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Speaker 1: the virus very effectively. And the bottom line is that

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Speaker 1: people are starting realized it is not necessary to do

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Speaker 1: over over reaction, uh you know to the barrus because

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Speaker 1: it doesn't cause various It's easy. Yeah, how much of

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Speaker 1: this I want to talk about the health challenge in

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Speaker 1: a moment, but I want to talk about the messaging

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Speaker 1: challenge as well, because it seems that over the past

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Speaker 1: three years or so it has been drummed into the

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Speaker 1: Chinese people that this is a very very serious disease.

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Speaker 1: But certainly here in Australia, I know people who have

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Speaker 1: had a multiple times and often said I've had worst

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Speaker 1: head colds. How much of an issue is the messaging

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Speaker 1: around rebranding COVID going to be? Well, clearly that the

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Speaker 1: messaging is not very clear because the current army currently

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Speaker 1: is quite different from the earlier viruses like the the

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Speaker 1: origin of virus and the later under Alpha better and

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Speaker 1: the last thee as derecta variants. Uh, the earlier virus

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Speaker 1: are much more passage and it means that it costs

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Speaker 1: more severe diseases. But the current virus it's only cost

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Speaker 1: mostly upper respirat tracking infections and usually it's a quite

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Speaker 1: you know, self limiting. But the thing is that you know,

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Speaker 1: as people experienced the first two years there many people

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Speaker 1: do not really or fully able to distinguish the current

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Speaker 1: Army chrome and earlier vowls. So when we're talking about

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Speaker 1: a coronavirus that people that this is deadly vows. So

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Speaker 1: I think this is something actually in the public health

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Speaker 1: sectors should put on the effort they're trying to add,

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Speaker 1: need to add educate people and let people know that Okay,

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Speaker 1: this is no longer highly deadly virus. If you take

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Speaker 1: proper public health measure and prevention measures, then you can't

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Speaker 1: get by it and then leave you a normal life.

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Speaker 1: M hm, of course, I mean it does still make

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Speaker 1: a number of people very very ill, and the experience

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Speaker 1: of other countries suggest that as reopening takes place, hospitalizations

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Speaker 1: rise as well. How well positioned the China's hospitals to

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Speaker 1: deal with the coming wave, Well, I think I'm quite

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Speaker 1: confident that the hospital is uh's propelled well for the

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Speaker 1: new search H. One reason is that over the years

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Speaker 1: China has been building up hospital facilities and also the

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Speaker 1: medical propelled nois for this type of diseases. Although China's

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Speaker 1: is a huge controls a huge population um over and

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Speaker 1: their health aceptor is a still you know, proportionately still

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Speaker 1: sometimes they have to um to to deal with a

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Speaker 1: large number of patients. But we have things that during

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Speaker 1: the Code nineteen pandemic, the government build our tremendous a

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Speaker 1: number for hospital beds, which is although many of them

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Speaker 1: must you know, makeshift the beds, but still they provide

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Speaker 1: a certain supplementary to the to the existing hospital facilities.

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Speaker 1: UM I think the hospital has adequate, adequate the facility

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Speaker 1: and the personnels will do with the communinety. And the

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Speaker 1: other thing is that if you look at the vaccination

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Speaker 1: rates overall, and that over n of the Chinese population

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Speaker 1: have received the full vaccination, although in the elderly population

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Speaker 1: the percentage is kind of low, prostiming about. So this

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Speaker 1: is the set which we need to put the focus

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Speaker 1: on to promote and encourage people to take vaccine. Of course,

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Speaker 1: we also need to propel medication as well in case

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Speaker 1: when people developed severey diseases and then they will give treatment. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: The elderly population also the most vulnerable in terms of

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Speaker 1: the potential death rate. Trying to set very low mortality

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Speaker 1: rates so far do you envisage that changing? Sure? Yeah, yeah, um,

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Speaker 1: what's your projection and and how's the how's the government

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Speaker 1: going to change its messaging around that? As well as

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Speaker 1: death rates inevitably rise, well, uh, that's rates we arrival.

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Speaker 1: But then that's what actually I think that what the

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Speaker 1: governor is doing is trying to formulate the policy. Um.

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Speaker 1: One The one thing is that um by increasing the

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Speaker 1: vaccination in the elderly population and also in the population

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Speaker 1: with the basical medical conditions. The second is that of

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Speaker 1: sus and some of the the current drugs such as

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Speaker 1: in some of the hospitals which I know already in

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Speaker 1: approachase that uh uh stocks for therapeutical drugs like a patrol, Harvy,

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Speaker 1: the by Fighter and those companies. So um, by doing this,

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Speaker 1: actually a hospital would be propelled for people who have

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Speaker 1: have a severity diseases. And by doing increasing the vaccination rates,

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Speaker 1: we significantly reduced, uh, the the severe cases I think

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Speaker 1: that's something the government is doing. But the other thing

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Speaker 1: is that unfortunately we're out of time, but thank you

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Speaker 1: so much for joining us on Bloomberg Daybreak Asia. That

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Speaker 1: is Professor Wu Xii here is the director of the

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Speaker 1: Center for Public Health Research at Nanjing University Medical School