China cannot hide the COVID death toll from its people

 Smartphones, internet and urban living rule out repeat of Mao's famine cover-up

Minxin Pei

January 10, 2023 05:00 JST

Patients await attention in the emergency department of Zhongshan Hospital in Shanghai on Jan. 3: Popular demand will grow for an explanation for the lack of preparation.   © Reuters

Minxin Pei is professor of government at Claremont McKenna College and a nonresident senior fellow of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

The surge of infections in China since the country ditched its zero-COVID policy last month has led to crowded hospitals and overwhelmed crematoriums, according to media reports that suggest deaths are skyrocketing.

The Chinese government, however, is doing its best to conceal the toll in lives and suffering. A narrowing of definitions means most coronavirus-related deaths are not tallied as such. Partly as a result, the authorities have been reporting unbelievably low numbers of COVID fatalities.

From Dec. 8 to Dec. 23, the National Health Commission said China had only seven deaths attributable to COVID, an implausible number given reports of bodies suddenly piling up in crematoriums. Last Sunday, the commission reported only three people died of COVID that day and that the total number of deaths since the pandemic began had still only reached 5,267.

The government has strong incentives to hide the catastrophe that is unfolding in the wake of its chaotic reopening. It certainly has no wish to take the blame for the lack of preparation for the exit wave of infections that had been widely expected.

The magnitude of death and suffering attributed to the surge, which estimates say could reach 1 million or more fatalities in the coming months, would make this COVID surge the most lethal event in peacetime China since the 1959-61 famine that followed the Great Leap Forward. That horrific episode saw an estimated 36 million people perish from starvation.

To cover up the COVID catastrophe, Chinese leaders today may be tempted to repeat the same tactics used by Mao Zedong then.

When tens of millions were dying of starvation, mostly in rural areas, Mao's regime imposed strict censorship. As a result, the extent of the disaster was largely concealed from the public.

After the famine was over, the party propaganda machine blamed nonexistent natural disasters for the economic collapse that followed the Great Leap Forward. Even today, the party euphemistically calls the period of the famine "the three difficult years."

Sadly, censorship and whitewashing have largely enabled the party to hide the truth about the worst famine in history from the Chinese people. Except for a small number of researchers, most Chinese, especially the young, know little about the episode.

But if the party thinks it can rely on falsehoods and censorship to cover up the COVID catastrophe, it is unlikely to succeed. Today's China is a totally different country than Mao's.

When the Great Leap famine ravaged the country, 80% of Chinese lived in the countryside and most victims were peasants without political power or means to record their suffering.

These days, 64% of the population lives in urban areas, according to the latest official data. This means that most COVID deaths will be urbanites from a range of social backgrounds.

Social elites and members of the middle class are likely to account for a significant share of the fatalities. Some observers have already noted a string of announcements of deaths among prominent older business people, scientists and other elites, often mentioning COVID as the cause.

Unlike the impoverished peasants victimized by the Great Leap famine six decades ago, Chinese today, including those in the countryside, have the technological means to record and preserve their collective memories.

A peasant family suffers from starvation in the wake of the disastrous economic policies of the Great Leap Forward.   © Universal Images Group/Getty Images

Due to censorship, poverty and undeveloped communications technologies, the Great Leap famine was the least well-documented tragedy of post-1949 China. Except for a small number of photos, no recorded oral history or documentary films of the famine exist. Books about the famine are still banned in China.

But with the widespread availability of digital technology, Chinese people now can easily document and disseminate the true extent of the devastation caused by the COVID surge. Despite censorship, savvy social media users are able to post pictures and video clips that put the lie to the official propaganda that only a tiny number of people have died of COVID.

Unlike the whitewashed Great Leap famine, the trauma experienced by the Chinese people during the COVID surge will be well-documented and carefully preserved. Since the exit wave will affect a large portion of the population throughout China, the situation today bears little resemblance to the original outbreak in Wuhan at the beginning of 2020.

While the government may have been able to largely conceal the true devastation in that city of 11 million, the authorities lack the capacity to prevent 1.4 billion people from sharing losses among their friends and family and making this tragedy an embittering conversation topic for years to come.

How Chinese people remember and talk about their experiences during the COVID surge with one another may have real political consequences.

At a minimum, the party's carefully crafted can-do image will be shattered by heartbreaking tales of people dying in hospital waiting areas and bodies piling up in crematoriums. Popular demand will grow for an explanation for the lack of preparation. Fissures may emerge inside the party as officials try to shift blame and appease public anger.

Ultimately, fiddling with the human toll of the COVID surge will be a losing proposition for Beijing. Fictitious numbers may make the Chinese government look good on paper, but they will fool no one, least of all the Chinese people.

As time goes on, personal recollections of the tragedy will resonate more powerfully and credibly with ordinary people. Because stories trump statistics in political messaging, the Chinese government has made the wrong bet by cooking the books instead of telling its people the brutal truth.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Opinion/China-cannot-hide-the-COVID-death-toll-from-its-people

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