Covid deaths go unmentioned in China’s state media. The Beijing Health Commission has not reported a death in two weeks either. But morticians, crematories and relatives tell a different story. They experience the devastating impact of the virus on a largely unvaccinated population firsthand.
While renowned epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan downplays the disease as “Common Cold Covid”, a Covid deaths model by Hong Kong University for the coming weeks and months does not bode well. It predicts up to one million deaths. Our team in Beijing describes the current situation in the country.
In the 18th century, the French philosopher Voltaire praised China as a pioneer of secular and humane civilization. The German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz referred to China as the “Europe of the East.” Today, there is not much left of such enthusiastic appreciation. The opinion of China is becoming increasingly negative, explains British sinologist Kerry Brown. And, incidentally, the reverse is also true: Rejection of the West is growing in China. In his new book, Brown takes a journey through time to the 16 most influential European thinkers on China over the past centuries, including many great names. Brown observes that one thing has remained constant to this day: China has always polarized – sometimes in one direction, sometimes in the other.
Mr. Brown, what was your motivation for your new book “China through European Eyes”?
The European Chinese relationship is an important one. It reaches back 500 to 400 years and I wanted to put together key figures and their voices from a long time ago to relatively recently that are principally China experts. People who would be known for work in other fields, the philosopher Leibniz and Montesquieu. That figures like these were thinking about China shows how important the subject was.
Did you expect the European-Chinese relationship to be under such scrutiny as it is right now?
The relationship is still difficult today because they are very complex partners. In very different ways, neither China nor Europe is straightforward. They have complex histories, they are internally complicated, and they have a very different kind of culture and set of beliefs. It isn’t surprising that their dialogue is not an easy one. But at least they do have a dialogue and are trying to speak to each other.
Documenting 16 key thinkers’ engagement with China – what was most surprising to you?
I first was interested in how views of China have always been quite polarized. They either have been very idealistic or critical, or negative or fearful. That pattern continues to this day. We have sinophobia or sinophilia. This study shows that this is not a new story.
What else did you notice?
The second thing is the long-held belief of Europeans that China is very different, both an alternative and counterpart to Europe in terms of its values. That is something that struck me when researching this book. That feeling is as strong today as it was 400 years ago so it is part of the structure of the relationship. You cannot imagine the relationship being without this characteristic now. It is a fundamental part of the relationship.
Who are today’s Leibniz, Hegel and Weber, Voltaires, and so on, who are deeply engaged in China for the last decade or so?
Jürgen Habermas would be one figure. He has written a lot about Europe and of course about generic issues like the public sphere, which of course can be applied to the case of China. I also believe he has lectured in China. The French philosopher Jacques Derrida also, before his death, did go to China to lecture there about twenty years ago.
Is that still the case today?
Most eminent economists or philosophers would probably be more willing to engage with colleagues in China and regard China as having an intellectual tradition as important as that of Europe. For key contemporary thinkers, it would be strange if they were working in the fields of economy, sociology, anthropology, or even history and they did not have some connections with China.
This year seems to be the Xi year. He secured a third term and in June alone, there were five new books on him. You wrote “Xi – A study in Power” about him. Did he contribute to the negative view of China?
It does not seem like his leadership has a very clear plan for what to do with the economy, which is clearly going through some stress at the moment. It is a very political leadership, going from the new leaders who emerged in October and their predominantly political rather than economic portfolios. While of course, Xi’s leadership is partly a response to China’s domestic challenges they are an acknowledgment that the outside world is quite hostile towards China. That has made Chinese leaders around Xi quite defensive.
Do you see any surprises coming up under Xi’s third term?
Most things that have surprised me so far have been in a bad rather than a good way. It would be nice to have a surprise of things that we have not expected. Political reform is not on the cards, but it was good that at the G20 this November Xi seemed to be speaking more with other leaders and stressing partnership and dialogue. But I think the current mindset of the Xi leadership is to do everything to maintain stability and to ensure the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is achieved.
His leadership is well-received?
For a lot of people in China, Xi and those around him are perhaps not popular, particularly in view of the lockdowns of late which have really antagonized people in big cities like Shanghai. But this group makes up 300 to 350 million people, which still leaves another billion who are more contented and at least trust the party to do the right thing and look after them. For these people, the tone of the outside world that they might read about in their own media is not attractive. They also see the very evident divisions, conflicts, and problems in America and Europe and elsewhere at the moment and that probably gives them pause for thought. Does the outside world really look like it is offering an attractive message or an alternative to them? There is also the issue of who Xi’s eventual successor will be. He is 70 next year. He cannot go on forever. But at the moment, no one seems to have come into view.
Are we already seeing the worst outcome of Xi’s leadership?
I think there is nothing good in the 21st century with an autocratic leader staying in power beyond 10 to 15 years. Mao Zedong was increasingly capricious and made poor decisions like supporting the Cultural Revolution after 15 years, Stalin after 10-15 years, Putin made increasingly poor decisions after 20 years. When you get to 15-20 years, that is when things really deteriorate. I do worry that if China gets into that position under Xi Jinping’s leadership and cannot self-correct and change this is going to be a massive problem for China and the rest of the world.
How do Europeans see China today, and how is that affected by the US?
They see China in a very complicated way, partly as a collaborator, partly as a competitor, and partly as an adversary. The European Commission used this structure in a statement on China issued in 2019. I think for most Europeans there are a lot of things about China that they do not like, but there are lots of areas where they acknowledge they have to work with China. They are quite pragmatic. They also have to balance their relationship with China alongside the one they have with the USA. America has a lot of influence in Europe and still puts pressure on it.
How can Europe deal with China in this complicated situation?
Germany Chancellor’s Scholz visit to China in October showed you could do things at the moment. He got criticism, but he also got a political outcome from China condemning the use of nuclear weapons by Russia against Ukraine. But we have to think hard about each of these delegations to China that go from Europeans to China – what do we want out of them? We need some diplomatic wins these days. Despite all this, China will continue to be a challenge to Europe. Europeans have to strive for balance within themselves, with China, and with other international partners like America.
How likely do you see the clash of systems?
The most urgent thing currently is to find a pragmatic framework where the world can deal with universal issues like climate change, pandemics, inequality, and sustainability, while also recognizing that politically there are and will continue to be very big differences between China and Europe. Despite this, it would be a historic tragedy – a disaster – if China and America were to clash with each militarily or otherwise because they have different political systems and their values are also different. The important thing to remember is that despite significant differences we are actually agreeing a lot on critically important challenges like climate change and its causes. That at least supplies some hope of one day resolving these issues.
Kerry Brown is Professor of Chinese Studies and Director of the Lau China Institute at Kings College, London, and an Associate Fellow on the Asia Pacific Programme at Chatham House. He is the author of 24 books on contemporary China, the most recent of which are ‘China Through European Eyes’ (with Chenger Gemma Deng) and ‘Xi: A Study of Power.‘
The state news agency Xinhua reported Sunday that there had been only 2,028 new Covid infections nationwide and not a single death. However, it is obvious that this information is false. With the end of zero-Covid, the testing system in China has also collapsed. Where there is no longer proper testing, there are hardly any official cases. China has surrendered to the pandemic.
In fact, anyone who lives in Beijing, for example, knows what is going on. Large parts of the city’s population are infected. Everyone knows someone who is ill. Some companies report 90 percent absenteeism due to illness. The situation is similar in Shanghai and other major cities. There are likely to be at least a few million new infections nationwide every day. And with the uncontrolled spread of the virus, what has happened everywhere else in the world is happening in China too: people are dying.
But not according to the Chinese state media at the moment. They systematically downplayed the risks since the abrupt change of course in Covid policy. According to the party-affiliated newspaper Global Times, the renowned epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan argued that the disease should only be called the “Common Cold” Covid virus. Media now repeatedly report that the virus is “mild”. Omicron may be milder, but it can still be deadly, especially for older people without adequate immunization. It seems all the more bizarre that the Health Commission has not reported any Covid deaths for a good two weeks.
The information does not match the results of an investigation by the Financial Times, which spoke to morticians and operators of crematories in Beijing. They said that new Covid deaths arrive every day. According to the report, many body bags have also been spotted in hospitals specializing in treating Covid cases. On social media, users are mourning their family members who died from the virus.
Scientists at the University of Hong Kong have calculated how many deaths China can expect in the coming weeks and months. In a new model, they have concluded that 684 per million people could die. Extrapolated to China’s total population, this would mean 964,400 deaths.
According to the study, the healthcare system in large parts of the country will be overwhelmed in the next two months. It would be possible to reduce the number of deaths to as low as 448 per million people. However, this scenario could only occur in the event of a “controlled opening.” But the leadership has already dropped all attempts at containment.
A rapid vaccination and booster campaign are also needed for a more positive scenario. Access to antiviral drugs would also have to be improved. But in practice, there is no time left for this. The scientists involved in the study had already accurately modeled the severe Covid outbreak in Hong Kong earlier this year. They had predicted 7,000 deaths; in the end, the actual number was around 9,000.
In recent months, scientists already modeled possible courses of an uncontrolled Covid wave and warned of the consequences. In May, a model from Shanghai’s Fudan University even calculated up to 1.6 million deaths (China.Table reported). At the time, China was still using the study’s findings to defend its zero-Covid policy. Joern Petring
In 2015, Tim Wenniges saw the lights of Shanghai for the first time from an airplane. He and his wife previously lived in Jakarta for a year, but China was at the top of their bucket list. Then an unexpected offer from the Konrad Adenauer Foundation landed on his desk. Wenniges was to head the local office. He and his wife did not think twice and went there. Seven years later, Wenniges now sits in his home in Stuttgart back in Germany and reminisces about his years in China.
The 44-year-old is now Managing Director for International Affairs at Suedwestmetall, the metal and electrical industry association in the German state of Baden-Wuerttemberg. He sees the focus of his job on keeping channels of communication open to China and business relations stable.
That is because the German industry continues to push into China. “Companies are continuing to diversify. That is smart. But there is simply no second China,” Wenniges says. In terms of sales – and also innovations – India, for example, will not become an alternative in the medium term. For this reason, he considers any form of decoupling from Germany unwise.
Of course, Wenniges sees that there are also efforts in China to break away from German companies. But the fact that China wanted to build their own cars at some point should not surprise anyone. “That was foreseeable and is understandable.”
Wenniges is now critical of the concept of “change through trade.” But he wonders how pressure can be put on the government otherwise. After all, “change without trade certainly doesn’t exist.” And China is not just Xi Jinping, he stresses. It is a country with great diversity and warm people. However, it is also a country with severe problems, such as an aging society (due to decades of one-child policies). “We must not see this country too one-dimensionally.”
During his time in the People’s Republic, he was fascinated by the dynamism, the future focus, and the interest in everything unknown. This is what immediately captivated him in China and among its people. He was able to travel throughout the country, often with his family of six. On the journey west, further and further inland, rice paddies passed by the train windows for miles.
It was the first time he realized how big the country actually was. “We over here know the life of a few 100 million Chinese on the east coast. But the reality of life for a billion people inland and in the west is not so easy to grasp.”
With the Covid pandemic, however, much has changed. This is what friends and colleagues who moved back from China to Germany say, Wenniges says. That curiosity that so intrigued him about people in China seven years ago is disappearing more and more. Tim Wenniges was no longer in China when the pandemic hit. In 2018, he returned to Germany. He wants to go back to China in March. Martin Hogger
At minus 20 degrees, northern China drowns in snow. In contrast, the south of the country enjoys pleasant temperatures of up to over 20 degrees. In Haikou on the island province of Hainan, there is even a trade fair for tropical agricultural products in December.
Covid deaths go unmentioned in China’s state media. The Beijing Health Commission has not reported a death in two weeks either. But morticians, crematories and relatives tell a different story. They experience the devastating impact of the virus on a largely unvaccinated population firsthand.
While renowned epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan downplays the disease as “Common Cold Covid”, a Covid deaths model by Hong Kong University for the coming weeks and months does not bode well. It predicts up to one million deaths. Our team in Beijing describes the current situation in the country.
In the 18th century, the French philosopher Voltaire praised China as a pioneer of secular and humane civilization. The German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz referred to China as the “Europe of the East.” Today, there is not much left of such enthusiastic appreciation. The opinion of China is becoming increasingly negative, explains British sinologist Kerry Brown. And, incidentally, the reverse is also true: Rejection of the West is growing in China. In his new book, Brown takes a journey through time to the 16 most influential European thinkers on China over the past centuries, including many great names. Brown observes that one thing has remained constant to this day: China has always polarized – sometimes in one direction, sometimes in the other.
Mr. Brown, what was your motivation for your new book “China through European Eyes”?
The European Chinese relationship is an important one. It reaches back 500 to 400 years and I wanted to put together key figures and their voices from a long time ago to relatively recently that are principally China experts. People who would be known for work in other fields, the philosopher Leibniz and Montesquieu. That figures like these were thinking about China shows how important the subject was.
Did you expect the European-Chinese relationship to be under such scrutiny as it is right now?
The relationship is still difficult today because they are very complex partners. In very different ways, neither China nor Europe is straightforward. They have complex histories, they are internally complicated, and they have a very different kind of culture and set of beliefs. It isn’t surprising that their dialogue is not an easy one. But at least they do have a dialogue and are trying to speak to each other.
Documenting 16 key thinkers’ engagement with China – what was most surprising to you?
I first was interested in how views of China have always been quite polarized. They either have been very idealistic or critical, or negative or fearful. That pattern continues to this day. We have sinophobia or sinophilia. This study shows that this is not a new story.
What else did you notice?
The second thing is the long-held belief of Europeans that China is very different, both an alternative and counterpart to Europe in terms of its values. That is something that struck me when researching this book. That feeling is as strong today as it was 400 years ago so it is part of the structure of the relationship. You cannot imagine the relationship being without this characteristic now. It is a fundamental part of the relationship.
Who are today’s Leibniz, Hegel and Weber, Voltaires, and so on, who are deeply engaged in China for the last decade or so?
Jürgen Habermas would be one figure. He has written a lot about Europe and of course about generic issues like the public sphere, which of course can be applied to the case of China. I also believe he has lectured in China. The French philosopher Jacques Derrida also, before his death, did go to China to lecture there about twenty years ago.
Is that still the case today?
Most eminent economists or philosophers would probably be more willing to engage with colleagues in China and regard China as having an intellectual tradition as important as that of Europe. For key contemporary thinkers, it would be strange if they were working in the fields of economy, sociology, anthropology, or even history and they did not have some connections with China.
This year seems to be the Xi year. He secured a third term and in June alone, there were five new books on him. You wrote “Xi – A study in Power” about him. Did he contribute to the negative view of China?
It does not seem like his leadership has a very clear plan for what to do with the economy, which is clearly going through some stress at the moment. It is a very political leadership, going from the new leaders who emerged in October and their predominantly political rather than economic portfolios. While of course, Xi’s leadership is partly a response to China’s domestic challenges they are an acknowledgment that the outside world is quite hostile towards China. That has made Chinese leaders around Xi quite defensive.
Do you see any surprises coming up under Xi’s third term?
Most things that have surprised me so far have been in a bad rather than a good way. It would be nice to have a surprise of things that we have not expected. Political reform is not on the cards, but it was good that at the G20 this November Xi seemed to be speaking more with other leaders and stressing partnership and dialogue. But I think the current mindset of the Xi leadership is to do everything to maintain stability and to ensure the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation is achieved.
His leadership is well-received?
For a lot of people in China, Xi and those around him are perhaps not popular, particularly in view of the lockdowns of late which have really antagonized people in big cities like Shanghai. But this group makes up 300 to 350 million people, which still leaves another billion who are more contented and at least trust the party to do the right thing and look after them. For these people, the tone of the outside world that they might read about in their own media is not attractive. They also see the very evident divisions, conflicts, and problems in America and Europe and elsewhere at the moment and that probably gives them pause for thought. Does the outside world really look like it is offering an attractive message or an alternative to them? There is also the issue of who Xi’s eventual successor will be. He is 70 next year. He cannot go on forever. But at the moment, no one seems to have come into view.
Are we already seeing the worst outcome of Xi’s leadership?
I think there is nothing good in the 21st century with an autocratic leader staying in power beyond 10 to 15 years. Mao Zedong was increasingly capricious and made poor decisions like supporting the Cultural Revolution after 15 years, Stalin after 10-15 years, Putin made increasingly poor decisions after 20 years. When you get to 15-20 years, that is when things really deteriorate. I do worry that if China gets into that position under Xi Jinping’s leadership and cannot self-correct and change this is going to be a massive problem for China and the rest of the world.
How do Europeans see China today, and how is that affected by the US?
They see China in a very complicated way, partly as a collaborator, partly as a competitor, and partly as an adversary. The European Commission used this structure in a statement on China issued in 2019. I think for most Europeans there are a lot of things about China that they do not like, but there are lots of areas where they acknowledge they have to work with China. They are quite pragmatic. They also have to balance their relationship with China alongside the one they have with the USA. America has a lot of influence in Europe and still puts pressure on it.
How can Europe deal with China in this complicated situation?
Germany Chancellor’s Scholz visit to China in October showed you could do things at the moment. He got criticism, but he also got a political outcome from China condemning the use of nuclear weapons by Russia against Ukraine. But we have to think hard about each of these delegations to China that go from Europeans to China – what do we want out of them? We need some diplomatic wins these days. Despite all this, China will continue to be a challenge to Europe. Europeans have to strive for balance within themselves, with China, and with other international partners like America.
How likely do you see the clash of systems?
The most urgent thing currently is to find a pragmatic framework where the world can deal with universal issues like climate change, pandemics, inequality, and sustainability, while also recognizing that politically there are and will continue to be very big differences between China and Europe. Despite this, it would be a historic tragedy – a disaster – if China and America were to clash with each militarily or otherwise because they have different political systems and their values are also different. The important thing to remember is that despite significant differences we are actually agreeing a lot on critically important challenges like climate change and its causes. That at least supplies some hope of one day resolving these issues.
Kerry Brown is Professor of Chinese Studies and Director of the Lau China Institute at Kings College, London, and an Associate Fellow on the Asia Pacific Programme at Chatham House. He is the author of 24 books on contemporary China, the most recent of which are ‘China Through European Eyes’ (with Chenger Gemma Deng) and ‘Xi: A Study of Power.‘
The state news agency Xinhua reported Sunday that there had been only 2,028 new Covid infections nationwide and not a single death. However, it is obvious that this information is false. With the end of zero-Covid, the testing system in China has also collapsed. Where there is no longer proper testing, there are hardly any official cases. China has surrendered to the pandemic.
In fact, anyone who lives in Beijing, for example, knows what is going on. Large parts of the city’s population are infected. Everyone knows someone who is ill. Some companies report 90 percent absenteeism due to illness. The situation is similar in Shanghai and other major cities. There are likely to be at least a few million new infections nationwide every day. And with the uncontrolled spread of the virus, what has happened everywhere else in the world is happening in China too: people are dying.
But not according to the Chinese state media at the moment. They systematically downplayed the risks since the abrupt change of course in Covid policy. According to the party-affiliated newspaper Global Times, the renowned epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan argued that the disease should only be called the “Common Cold” Covid virus. Media now repeatedly report that the virus is “mild”. Omicron may be milder, but it can still be deadly, especially for older people without adequate immunization. It seems all the more bizarre that the Health Commission has not reported any Covid deaths for a good two weeks.
The information does not match the results of an investigation by the Financial Times, which spoke to morticians and operators of crematories in Beijing. They said that new Covid deaths arrive every day. According to the report, many body bags have also been spotted in hospitals specializing in treating Covid cases. On social media, users are mourning their family members who died from the virus.
Scientists at the University of Hong Kong have calculated how many deaths China can expect in the coming weeks and months. In a new model, they have concluded that 684 per million people could die. Extrapolated to China’s total population, this would mean 964,400 deaths.
According to the study, the healthcare system in large parts of the country will be overwhelmed in the next two months. It would be possible to reduce the number of deaths to as low as 448 per million people. However, this scenario could only occur in the event of a “controlled opening.” But the leadership has already dropped all attempts at containment.
A rapid vaccination and booster campaign are also needed for a more positive scenario. Access to antiviral drugs would also have to be improved. But in practice, there is no time left for this. The scientists involved in the study had already accurately modeled the severe Covid outbreak in Hong Kong earlier this year. They had predicted 7,000 deaths; in the end, the actual number was around 9,000.
In recent months, scientists already modeled possible courses of an uncontrolled Covid wave and warned of the consequences. In May, a model from Shanghai’s Fudan University even calculated up to 1.6 million deaths (China.Table reported). At the time, China was still using the study’s findings to defend its zero-Covid policy. Joern Petring
In 2015, Tim Wenniges saw the lights of Shanghai for the first time from an airplane. He and his wife previously lived in Jakarta for a year, but China was at the top of their bucket list. Then an unexpected offer from the Konrad Adenauer Foundation landed on his desk. Wenniges was to head the local office. He and his wife did not think twice and went there. Seven years later, Wenniges now sits in his home in Stuttgart back in Germany and reminisces about his years in China.
The 44-year-old is now Managing Director for International Affairs at Suedwestmetall, the metal and electrical industry association in the German state of Baden-Wuerttemberg. He sees the focus of his job on keeping channels of communication open to China and business relations stable.
That is because the German industry continues to push into China. “Companies are continuing to diversify. That is smart. But there is simply no second China,” Wenniges says. In terms of sales – and also innovations – India, for example, will not become an alternative in the medium term. For this reason, he considers any form of decoupling from Germany unwise.
Of course, Wenniges sees that there are also efforts in China to break away from German companies. But the fact that China wanted to build their own cars at some point should not surprise anyone. “That was foreseeable and is understandable.”
Wenniges is now critical of the concept of “change through trade.” But he wonders how pressure can be put on the government otherwise. After all, “change without trade certainly doesn’t exist.” And China is not just Xi Jinping, he stresses. It is a country with great diversity and warm people. However, it is also a country with severe problems, such as an aging society (due to decades of one-child policies). “We must not see this country too one-dimensionally.”
During his time in the People’s Republic, he was fascinated by the dynamism, the future focus, and the interest in everything unknown. This is what immediately captivated him in China and among its people. He was able to travel throughout the country, often with his family of six. On the journey west, further and further inland, rice paddies passed by the train windows for miles.
It was the first time he realized how big the country actually was. “We over here know the life of a few 100 million Chinese on the east coast. But the reality of life for a billion people inland and in the west is not so easy to grasp.”
With the Covid pandemic, however, much has changed. This is what friends and colleagues who moved back from China to Germany say, Wenniges says. That curiosity that so intrigued him about people in China seven years ago is disappearing more and more. Tim Wenniges was no longer in China when the pandemic hit. In 2018, he returned to Germany. He wants to go back to China in March. Martin Hogger
At minus 20 degrees, northern China drowns in snow. In contrast, the south of the country enjoys pleasant temperatures of up to over 20 degrees. In Haikou on the island province of Hainan, there is even a trade fair for tropical agricultural products in December.
