[Throwawayaerlei]

My understanding is that Xi and the CCP he controls simply didn't prepare for this besides administering without mandates the PRC's two major indigenous vaccines which appear to be subpar in general. Although as inactivated whole virus ones in theory they could stand up better to variant mutations by presenting more proteins to our adaptive immune systems than the spike focused ones, see how in early testing Bharat Biotech's Covaxin showed activity against the nucleocapsid protein.

But building capacity in real hospitals or facilities that can do the basics of for medium serious cases that for example require supplemental oxygen? Nothing I've read of, just austere isolation facilities to support Xi's Zero COVID policy. Now we can be sure Xi and company are focusing on managing the fallout from the policy's end that was forced on them, which only tangentially will have anything to do with limiting the population's morbidity and mortality.

[toomuchtodo]

Based on the my reading of the situation, this is an accurate representation. Compounding this is that the older population in China is hesitant to get additional vaccination doses, so the CCP is stuck between a rock and a hard place. They can either slog along with their zero COVID policy (which reached a boiling over point with the citizenry) or they can rip the bandaid off and tolerate any loss of life that occurs. No good options, just different bad ones.

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/12/09/1140830...

> The problem of under-vaccination is most acute among the elderly. The government announced a little over a week ago that around 30% of people aged 60 and up — or roughly 80 million people — were not vaccinated and boosted as of Nov. 11. Among those 80 or older, the ratio was closer to 60%.