China had almost two million excess deaths after the end of ‘zero-Covid,’ U.S. study finds

There were almost two million excess deaths in the two months after China lifted its “zero-Covid” restrictions, a U.S. study found, contradicting official figures from Beijing that have been criticized as too low.

Researchers estimate there were 1.87 million excess deaths from all causes among people 30 years and older from December 2022 to January, according to the study from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle published Thursday. The deaths, which were observed across all mainland Chinese provinces, except Tibet, were predominantly among older people.

China’s strict zero-Covid policies, which included mass testing, border closures and extended citywide lockdowns, kept Covid cases and deaths to a minimum for much of the pandemic. But when the government abruptly lifted the restrictions in December after rare mass protests across the country, the virus was unleashed on 1.4 billion people who had barely been exposed to it.

The resulting wave of cases, driven by the highly transmissible omicron variant, brought a huge increase in hospitalizations and deaths that experts say were under-reported by officials. They pointed to anecdotal evidence, as well as satellite imagery showing heightened activity at crematoriums and funeral homes.

The 1.87 million figure is far higher than the official data from China, which said about 60,000 Covid–related deaths had been recorded in health facilities from early December 2022 to Jan. 12.

It is also consistent with estimates by other researchers, including a study by Zhanwei Du of the University of Hong Kong and Lauren Ancel Meyers of the University of Texas at Austin that found Covid may have killed more than 1.4 million people in China from Dec. 16, 2022 to Jan. 19.

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Article URL : https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/china-excess-deaths-zero-covid-study-rcna101746