According to that article, COVID may have resulted in a million deaths in China above the long-term trend line in the last 3 years. This is known as the excess mortality rate, which we can directly compare to other countries even if China lied about COVID mortality (and hey, maybe they did - it would be in their own interests so it’s plausible)
According to this article, since the pandemic began the US’s excess deaths have also sparked sharply even as the COVID mortality rate falls in official government data (sound familiar?) FTA: Since the pandemic began, excess deaths are up by more than 1.25 million in the U.S., about 15% higher than in the pre-pandemic years. That’s worse even when you don’t take populations into account!
Now we can do excess deaths per capita to compare these two policies:
China’s population is notoriously huge, with currently 1.412 billion people living in China. 1 million excess deaths among 1.412 billion people gives us an excess death rate of ~0.07%
America is a much smaller country, with 331.9 million people. 1.25 million excess deaths among 331.9 million gives us an excess death rate of ~0.38%
That means America’s policies were 5x worse on a per capita basis. The zero COVID policy wasn’t perfect, but it was a hell of a lot better than the Let 'er Rip! policy of the rest of the West.
America is the worst of its cohorts, but the rest of the West failed too!
France had 151,000 excess deaths. At that rate China would have lost over 3 million
Germany had 254,000 excess deaths . At that rate China would have lost over 4 million
Britain had 237,000 excess deaths. At that rate China would have lost just under 5 million.
In fairness, China only barely outcompeted South Korea at 42,000 excess deaths - at that rate China would have lost 1.14 million instead of a measly 1 million. That’s still 140,000 lives that were saved because of zero COVID that would have died with the extremely effective South Korean policies.
In conclusion, China is a positive force in the world and I know which side I’m on in the next Cold War.
I actually wrote that comment out a while back when arguing with someone about zero COVID and wanted to make sure it carried over to this lemmy profile lol
Not really, some groups get banned for being anti-Chinese (and usually fronts for US imperialism lol), but I’ll grant that the current state of queer rights and acceptance is behind the West. It’s mostly kneejerk anti-Western culture war bullshit (that is being inflamed by the US using us as political pawns), but there have been recent moves towards acceptance that I’m hoping lead to more progress on the issue. There are reasons to be optimistic about China’s future.
Are there reasons to be optimistic about America at this point?
I’ll preface this with saying I understand China probably lied about its numbers. There’s no way the zero COVID policy actually resulted in zero COVID.
According to that article, COVID may have resulted in a million deaths in China above the long-term trend line in the last 3 years. This is known as the excess mortality rate, which we can directly compare to other countries even if China lied about COVID mortality (and hey, maybe they did - it would be in their own interests so it’s plausible)
According to this article, since the pandemic began the US’s excess deaths have also sparked sharply even as the COVID mortality rate falls in official government data (sound familiar?) FTA: Since the pandemic began, excess deaths are up by more than 1.25 million in the U.S., about 15% higher than in the pre-pandemic years. That’s worse even when you don’t take populations into account!
Now we can do excess deaths per capita to compare these two policies:
China’s population is notoriously huge, with currently 1.412 billion people living in China. 1 million excess deaths among 1.412 billion people gives us an excess death rate of ~0.07%
America is a much smaller country, with 331.9 million people. 1.25 million excess deaths among 331.9 million gives us an excess death rate of ~0.38%
That means America’s policies were 5x worse on a per capita basis. The zero COVID policy wasn’t perfect, but it was a hell of a lot better than the Let 'er Rip! policy of the rest of the West.
If China had responded as badly as the US and had an excess death rate of ~0.38% then over 5 million people would have died. Zero COVID saved so many lives that Chinese life expectancy actually rose above American life expectancy!
America is the worst of its cohorts, but the rest of the West failed too!
France had 151,000 excess deaths. At that rate China would have lost over 3 million
Germany had 254,000 excess deaths . At that rate China would have lost over 4 million
Britain had 237,000 excess deaths. At that rate China would have lost just under 5 million.
In fairness, China only barely outcompeted South Korea at 42,000 excess deaths - at that rate China would have lost 1.14 million instead of a measly 1 million. That’s still 140,000 lives that were saved because of zero COVID that would have died with the extremely effective South Korean policies.
In conclusion, China is a positive force in the world and I know which side I’m on in the next Cold War.
Pick a side liberals. 😘
I made this meme because I got that result in Plague Inc and also China had stopped updating numbers. It’s a meme so I wouldn’t take it serious.
Interesting nickname btw. :)
I actually wrote that comment out a while back when arguing with someone about zero COVID and wanted to make sure it carried over to this lemmy profile lol
thx btw :3
Lgbtq acceptance is banned in China.
Not really, some groups get banned for being anti-Chinese (and usually fronts for US imperialism lol), but I’ll grant that the current state of queer rights and acceptance is behind the West. It’s mostly kneejerk anti-Western culture war bullshit (that is being inflamed by the US using us as political pawns), but there have been recent moves towards acceptance that I’m hoping lead to more progress on the issue. There are reasons to be optimistic about China’s future.
Are there reasons to be optimistic about America at this point?