Over 90% of the residents of China's Henan province - the third largest in terms of population - have been infected with the corona virus, the local authorities said in a rare statement about the extent of the spread of the virus in the current wave of the Omicron variant.
The head of the Henan Health Commission, Kan Quancheng, said that the infection reached almost every one of the residents, and it amounted to the fact that at least 88.5 million of the 90 million residents were infected with the virus.
He did not specify when the infection in question occurred, but noted that severe hospitalizations peaked on December 19.
It is likely that the situation in the other provinces in China is similar, since in recent weeks the restrictions on traveling within the People's Republic have been lifted, and this week the obligation to isolate those arriving in China from outside has been lifted (but entry is still limited to citizens or tourists with dual citizenship and special permits).
Surprisingly, the official websites of the Beijing authorities, such as the China Daily, echoed the things coming from Hanan and gave them a positive spin.
"Hanan managed to reach the peak of infection in the current season and entered a smooth transition period," the newspaper said, which also included quotes from the locals.
As a reminder, according to the leaks recently published in "Bloomberg", over 240 million Chinese were infected in the first 20 days of last December, among other things due to the lifting of the various restrictions and the end of the policy of flash closures in light of the residents' protest - but also due to the arrival of winter and the lack of Western vaccines.
This is the most severe wave that China has known since the outbreak of the epidemic about three years ago.
According to China's official publications, only about 120,000 have been infected with the virus in mainland China since the internal restrictions were lifted and only about 30 have died from the symptoms of the respiratory disease "Covid-19" that the virus causes, including three on Sunday.
Like Hanan, sister provinces also recently provided data that contradicts the central government.
Authorities in Qingdao province recently said that a million people are infected every day.
It seems that following the current wave and the lack of cooperation on the part of the residents, China has turned the policy of "zero local infection" into a much more liberal policy of dealing with the virus, and is actually striving to create herd immunity, and at the same time has raised a gear when it comes to importing Western medicines (but not vaccines).
It is estimated that the current wave of infections will increase the pace in the coming week due to the multitude of events and travel within China on the occasion of marking the "Year of the Rabbit" in the last week of January, and then it will probably moderate.
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