WEBVTT - Michelle Cortez on China Covid (Audio)

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<v Speaker 1>China is apparently shutting down the city of sija Jong.

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<v Speaker 1>This is a city of eleven million people not too

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<v Speaker 1>far from Beijing, and Beijing also reported, as I mentioned,

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<v Speaker 1>and med its first COVID related deaths in six months.

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<v Speaker 1>So joining us now to talk about this more. Michelle

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<v Speaker 1>Cortez Bloomberg Medical Science and Tech reporter, Michelle, this is

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<v Speaker 1>a pivotal moment, isn't it. What is trying to get

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<v Speaker 1>to do next? This is exactly what we've all been

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<v Speaker 1>wondering here. What's going to happen. There's no doubt about it.

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<v Speaker 1>China is trying to find its way out of this

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<v Speaker 1>COVID zero malady. And the problem is that when you

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<v Speaker 1>start opening up, you're going to start seeing more cases

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<v Speaker 1>and more deaths. So they really are going to have

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<v Speaker 1>to make a decision between whether or not they want

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<v Speaker 1>to open up and accept a little bit more COVID

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<v Speaker 1>in the country, or whether they want to really try

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<v Speaker 1>to protect everybody. This is the first stuff that we've

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<v Speaker 1>we've seen, as you said, since May, there's three of them,

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<v Speaker 1>all in Beijing, but tens of thousands of cases every day.

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<v Speaker 1>We know these deaths numbers are going to increase The

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<v Speaker 1>question is is what is the response going to be

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<v Speaker 1>from the government. So the gentleman the past over the weekend,

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<v Speaker 1>I believe on on Saturday was eighty seven years old.

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<v Speaker 1>Do we have to begin to delineate or at least

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<v Speaker 1>separate in terms of age here, I mean the elderly population.

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<v Speaker 1>Is we know I mean from the pandemic that we've

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<v Speaker 1>been going through for the last nearly three years now,

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<v Speaker 1>that older folks are much much more at risk. Yeah, well, absolutely,

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<v Speaker 1>we do know that that's the elderly folks that are

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<v Speaker 1>more at risk, also those who are under vaccinated or unvaccinated,

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<v Speaker 1>which a lot of elderly in China are under an unvaccinated.

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<v Speaker 1>The thing is is that China has not made this

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<v Speaker 1>distinction that that you're making right, that the idea that

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<v Speaker 1>you know, people do die if these folks are are elderly,

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<v Speaker 1>they have multiple other conditions. How hard should the country work,

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<v Speaker 1>how much pain should everyone else suffer to make sure

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<v Speaker 1>somebody who's you know, an octogenarian has a few more weeks, months,

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<v Speaker 1>years of life. And in China they have really committed

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<v Speaker 1>to that. They have said that they're not going to

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<v Speaker 1>back down, that the help of everyone in their number

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<v Speaker 1>one priority, and now that's really being put to the test.

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<v Speaker 1>They were getting a little bit more freedom to each

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<v Speaker 1>individual city to make that decision. That's the thing that

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<v Speaker 1>we're wondering whether or not we're gonna hear something from

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<v Speaker 1>the top that hege we really don't want to put

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<v Speaker 1>anyone at higher risk. What's the status of the vaccination

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<v Speaker 1>rolled out at the moment. We are still really under

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<v Speaker 1>vaccinated in China. I mean, they did use a less

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<v Speaker 1>effective vaccine to begin with, but they did a great

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<v Speaker 1>job getting it out in the beginning. The problem is

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<v Speaker 1>that since the outbreak in Shanghai this spring, the number

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<v Speaker 1>of people getting vaccinated every day, every week, every month

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<v Speaker 1>has been quite low. So we have a you know,

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<v Speaker 1>a few millions, you know, maybe dozens of millions, maybe

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<v Speaker 1>a hundred million people in China who have been vaccinated

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<v Speaker 1>in the last six months, but but more than a

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<v Speaker 1>billion people haven't, thoughten vaccinated in the past six months,

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<v Speaker 1>and that's when the immunity from the vaccine really starts

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<v Speaker 1>to wayne. And of course there's very little virus circulating there,

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<v Speaker 1>so there's no natural immunity, so China is really very

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<v Speaker 1>vulnerable still, you know, we were talking a lot about

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<v Speaker 1>the market's response to this. Michelle, is there a real

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<v Speaker 1>risk here that there is some form of reversion that

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<v Speaker 1>we that we kind of move away from a lot

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<v Speaker 1>of the positivity that had been created after the Party

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<v Speaker 1>Congress and and come to a situation that is much

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<v Speaker 1>more a strict and dire. Well, we are actually seeing

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<v Speaker 1>some reversion already in a Juan, as you guys said

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<v Speaker 1>originally that we as I understand that, but the test

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<v Speaker 1>case starts opening up, and we are seeing them going

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<v Speaker 1>back into a lockdown, asking people to not go out,

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<v Speaker 1>closing schools and whatnot. So yeah, absolutely there's a risk.

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<v Speaker 1>There is all kinds of risk, whether they see these

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<v Speaker 1>massive outbreaks, people flooding into hospitals and you know, stick

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<v Speaker 1>and elderly dying, or whether or not they don't do

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<v Speaker 1>that and they lock everything back down and then folks

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<v Speaker 1>can't be getting out to their jobs and everyone trying

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<v Speaker 1>to go into a closed bot system and a manufacturing facility.

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<v Speaker 1>So you know, whether they can dread this needle, it's

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<v Speaker 1>going to be very, very tough. It'll be interesting to watch. Honestly,

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<v Speaker 1>they haven't really leaned into the science to do it yet.

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<v Speaker 1>So they're taking away some of the messaging and some

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<v Speaker 1>of the vaccination and some of the things that could

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<v Speaker 1>help them do it more easily. But they do still

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<v Speaker 1>have time. You would think three years into this the

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<v Speaker 1>pandemic that they would know better is what they need

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<v Speaker 1>to be doing, But they're still figuring it out, just

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<v Speaker 1>like every single other country in the world did. Of course,

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<v Speaker 1>China has been very proud of its record on protecting

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<v Speaker 1>its own population and frequently launched to put into Western countries,

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<v Speaker 1>and they're comparatively elevated death rates. But what a local

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<v Speaker 1>media saying now, has there been any discernible shift in tone.

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<v Speaker 1>There really hasn't been much of a discernible shift in

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<v Speaker 1>tone from the state media. They have been saying that

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<v Speaker 1>the changes recently were just to I tune and if

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<v Speaker 1>they were going to actually go harder in some of

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<v Speaker 1>the more narrow measures so that they don't have to

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<v Speaker 1>go more broadly. The biggest ship that we're seeing is

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<v Speaker 1>in the social media. So many people are just very

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<v Speaker 1>very angry about the restrictions and of course being shut down,

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<v Speaker 1>the snap lockdown, the keeping your kids home from school.

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<v Speaker 1>A lot of people have been quite upset about that.

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<v Speaker 1>More significantly, we're hearing from some people that they're not

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<v Speaker 1>as afraid of the virus as they were in the beginning.

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<v Speaker 1>That's a real fear, of course, because China has been saying,

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<v Speaker 1>as you say, that they are protecting the country, that

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<v Speaker 1>they have such a better record, which, of course, as

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<v Speaker 1>you say, they do. But people are less afraid of it,

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<v Speaker 1>and they're realizing that it's just because you get it,

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<v Speaker 1>doesn't mean you're going to die, doesn't mean you're gonna

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<v Speaker 1>affect your parents and kill them. And as more people

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<v Speaker 1>realize more accurately what this virus looks like, the easier

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<v Speaker 1>it's going to be for China to get out of it.

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<v Speaker 1>So you're talking about the public reaction. During our production

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<v Speaker 1>meeting today, we were talking about two gentlemen I believe

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<v Speaker 1>I can't called the city on the mainland uh in

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<v Speaker 1>which they were residing, that they were kind of convicted

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<v Speaker 1>for a four four years sentence and and sentenced subsequently

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<v Speaker 1>for for violating COVID policy. I mean, what do we

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<v Speaker 1>know about the degree to which people have been compliant. Well,

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<v Speaker 1>by and large, people have been very very compliant. People

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<v Speaker 1>do stay in their homes, they don't go out you know,

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<v Speaker 1>and as a result, anytime there is some kind of

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<v Speaker 1>a big outpouring of reaction and we tend to write

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<v Speaker 1>about it. So we've been doing a lot of those

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<v Speaker 1>stories lately. But honestly, it's it's noteworthy in that there's

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<v Speaker 1>not that many of them, right. You see some people

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<v Speaker 1>occasionally trying to rush out of an idea or scale

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<v Speaker 1>a gate to get out of a lockdown. By and large,

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<v Speaker 1>most of the country is still pretty compliant, but there's

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<v Speaker 1>no doubt about it that they have been very strict

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<v Speaker 1>about staying with the rules. That is an area actually

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<v Speaker 1>where we did see a change from the Standing Committees

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<v Speaker 1>and the Paul Bureau came out about a week or

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<v Speaker 1>two ago now where they changed some of the directions

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<v Speaker 1>and some of the rules that they were going to

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<v Speaker 1>um carry out. And one of the things that they

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<v Speaker 1>did no longer say is that it would be against

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<v Speaker 1>the law to say anything against COVID here. Okay, Michelle

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<v Speaker 1>will leave it there, Thanks so much. Michelle Cortez, Bloomberg's

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<v Speaker 1>medical science and Tech reporter,