The United States fears that the uncontrolled outbreak of COVID-19 in China could lead to new mutations of the virus as the world’s most populous country continues to grapple with the impact of easing protocols.”covidzero” which had kept the pandemic at bay.
“When it comes to the current outbreak in China, we want it addressed,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said at a briefing on Monday. “We know that whenever the virus spreads in nature, it has the potential to mutate and pose a threat to people around the world.”
Chinese cities are seeing a surge in COVID-19 cases and concerns are growing that the government may be hiding the true toll of the virus, after years of insistence that the Communist Party he had handled the health crisis more skillfully than the West. On Monday, police and security guards removed journalists from a Beijing crematorium.
A spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Price’s statement.
Relaxation of COVID-19 measures in China
The outbreak escalated after the government’s decision to lift a number of restrictions, including quarantine protocols, which had largely isolated 1.4 billion Chinese from the worst impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
China’s U-turn on COVID-19 followed late November protests in numerous cities after containment measures were blamed for deaths following a wildfire in western China. Xinjiang.
Health agencies, including the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), have been looking for new variants such as delta or omicron as waves of COVID-19 hit several countries around the world. The new variants “allow the virus to spread more easily or make it resistant to treatments or vaccines,” according to the CDC.
United States, which will send a delegation led by the Secretary of State, Anthony Blinkin Beijing early in the new year, he hopes China can bring the current COVID-19 outbreak under control, in part because any further blows to the Asian nation could further damage the world and the economy, Price said.
“The death toll from the virus is a cause for concern for the rest of the world, given the size of China’s GDP,” he said. “Not only is it good for China to be in a stronger position against COVID, it’s also good for the rest of the world.”
