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Speaker 1: And let's talk more about the latest in China. Joining

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Speaker 1: us as Anna Tang and senior fellow at the Tiger

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Speaker 1: Institute from Beijing. I think probably the best thing, Ana

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Speaker 1: is just to ask you what you are seeing on

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Speaker 1: the streets of Beijing as as we watch these images

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Speaker 1: of protests in Beijing, Shanghai, hang Jel. We know that

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Speaker 1: there was heavy police presence overnight which thwarted another night

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Speaker 1: of of bigger unrest. But what's the mood like at

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Speaker 1: the moment. Well, the mood right now is watchful. I

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Speaker 1: mean people are trying to see what's going to happen.

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Speaker 1: Obviously very quiet night last night, and as pretty much

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Speaker 1: as that's what's going to be expected going through, it

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Speaker 1: would be surprising if you see a resurgence of these

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Speaker 1: kinds of protests. Uh. They're not only um, you know,

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Speaker 1: difficult in terms of civil unrest, but also it's counterproductive.

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Speaker 1: If you're out there in large crowds during a a spike, Uh,

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Speaker 1: it's greater more likely than not that you're going to

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Speaker 1: pass it on to people around you and then we're

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Speaker 1: gonna take it home. So maybe we don't see much

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Speaker 1: more in the way of protesting, but that doesn't necessarily

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Speaker 1: mean that pressure, what's the force underneath it is going

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Speaker 1: to subside? Might there not be uh an increased risk

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Speaker 1: that down the road we could see something on a

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Speaker 1: larger scale. Doug, you know that that is a concern.

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Speaker 1: But I mean, right now you see the government rapidly

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Speaker 1: moving to diffuse the situation. I wouldn't be surprised if

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Speaker 1: they start coming out with metrics and making more more

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Speaker 1: clear what people should expect. One of the things is

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Speaker 1: they have to get a little tougher on vaccines. Uh.

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Speaker 1: They have a large elderly contingent who have never gotten

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Speaker 1: the vaccine. Because China was so successful early it's days

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Speaker 1: with only five thousand deaths and I mean a less

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Speaker 1: than six thousand deaths total um, people were kind of

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Speaker 1: lulled into the sense, but why should I get a vaccine?

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Speaker 1: You know, I don't know anybody who has it. It

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Speaker 1: doesn't seem to be a risk. Now they need to

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Speaker 1: get those people on board. It can't open up safely

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Speaker 1: without these people be vaccinated. Even the vaccination itself is

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Speaker 1: no guarantee, but it's the best defense in addition to

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Speaker 1: things like packs of it and things like that. So

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Speaker 1: that's obviously the most oppressing thing that needs to be

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Speaker 1: completed before China considers reopening. And why the government is

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Speaker 1: being so harsh here with their restrictions in your view though,

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Speaker 1: with these protests that that are building and unrest and

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Speaker 1: people turning to what China calls so called foreign apps

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Speaker 1: that they have to get around the firewall to use,

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Speaker 1: how does this the popularity that the people power, I

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Speaker 1: should say, perhaps change the dull When do you think

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Speaker 1: we could see President she back down here? Well, I

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Speaker 1: don't think you're going to see any kind of back down.

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Speaker 1: I mean, they're going to still be expressing the zero

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Speaker 1: COVID policy. But you you even before hand, Um, the

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Speaker 1: reason we are where we are is because they were

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Speaker 1: adjusting that they were cutting down the number of days

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Speaker 1: that you had to be in quarantine if you're coming

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Speaker 1: from outside. They were loosening restrictions, taking a much more

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Speaker 1: surgical approach to it. But that resulted in the spike

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Speaker 1: and as a result that, you know, people said, oh

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Speaker 1: my goodness. And then there was the uh, the World

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Speaker 1: Cup where many you know citizens, we're seeing people, you know,

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Speaker 1: huge numbers and crowds and stadiums and um, you know,

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Speaker 1: the players hugging each other and things like that, and

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Speaker 1: they're thinking, well, maybe the pandemic is over. Well it

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Speaker 1: isn't really over, and you know, the science is still there.

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Speaker 1: They need to get to a metric about six of

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Speaker 1: the people vaccinated within the last six months, so either

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Speaker 1: a booster or a complete vaccination. Otherwise it's just the

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Speaker 1: fear that their medical facilities could be overwhelmed. Do we

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Speaker 1: need to talk about the efficacy of the vaccines. I mean,

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Speaker 1: in the case of China, some of the vaccines domestically

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Speaker 1: produced have been not as effective as Western vaccines, and

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Speaker 1: I'm thinking in particular of the m r N A shots.

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Speaker 1: A few weeks back, though Beijing did approve for emergency

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Speaker 1: use the BioNTech vaccine for foreign expats. Is there a

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Speaker 1: point where you can see Beijing maybe looking to or

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Speaker 1: for wider adoption of these Western produced m RNA vaccines.

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Speaker 1: Is a way to kind of tackle the situation? Well,

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Speaker 1: I hope so. I mean, as science should not be politicized,

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Speaker 1: and you know that goes both ways. UM, China has

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Speaker 1: uh two or three mRNA vaccines which are in trial,

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Speaker 1: but it's going very slowly obviously, Uh. You know, one

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Speaker 1: option is to adopt the mrn A vaccines have done.

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Speaker 1: There is some trepidation. They say, well, you know it

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Speaker 1: hasn't really been tested. If we approve this, you know,

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Speaker 1: this isn't like a two party system where we can

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Speaker 1: just sit out the next time because we made a mistake.

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Speaker 1: One party means that there's only one group that you

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Speaker 1: can look at in terms of responsibility. And and this

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Speaker 1: is one of the things that's really holding China back

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Speaker 1: is that there's this fear of doing something wrong. At

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Speaker 1: some point, you do have to take calculated risks. I

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Speaker 1: do think they're they're getting there. Um, obviously they have

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Speaker 1: this new nasal uh, you know, the spray vaccine that

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Speaker 1: you can take and be very easy to administer, especially

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Speaker 1: at all of these checkpoints where they have testing. Uh,

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Speaker 1: if you can just you know, go from one place

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Speaker 1: in the next place or at the same place, get

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Speaker 1: the vaccine and all you're doing is inhaling it, that

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Speaker 1: may be an option. Obviously everything should be on the

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Speaker 1: table um. But you know, as I said, people do

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Speaker 1: not want to make mistakes. It's often fatal to your

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Speaker 1: career in China. Yeah, and just tell us a little bit.

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Speaker 1: I guess about the other side though, because we've seen

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Speaker 1: those images of protesters. We know, as I mentioned, since

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Speaker 1: it's scribbing social media of any mentions of unrest. But

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Speaker 1: is their support as well for these lockdowns, Well, there are,

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Speaker 1: I mean, you're quite curiously down in Guangdong. When they

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Speaker 1: started opening up and loosening um the number of days

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Speaker 1: that you had been quarantined. There was a lot of

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Speaker 1: concern about the number of people coming over from Hong Kong.

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Speaker 1: They said, look, you know these You know, the COVID

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Speaker 1: is rapid in Hong Kong. All you're doing is importing

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Speaker 1: it into China. Um local officials and people were saying, look,

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Speaker 1: you don't, don't let them in, and this kind of

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Speaker 1: you know, it's very dangerous because people start looking at

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Speaker 1: foreigners as the problem and it's really a global issue.

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Speaker 1: I thank you for your time. Aina Tangan is senior

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Speaker 1: fellow at the Taiher Institute, joining us from Beijing.