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2022-04-28

Xi Jinping Is Betting It All on Zero Covid

This is a news story from The Wall Street Journal by Eyck Freymann. This article is about President Xi Jinping's zero COVID goal. The author argues that this is a risky move for President Xi, as enforcing a zero COVID policy could have many economic ramifications. As of Monday, 45 cities with 373 million people, representing 40% of China’s gross domestic product, were under partial or full lockdown, according to Nomura estimates. More cities and counties are under “static management,” a euphemism for quasi-lockdown. President Xi's COVID policy gets compared to Chairman Mao Zedong's Great Leap Forward, where it can start with a noble intention, but turn deadly for the population. Just like Mao faced great food shortages after the Great Leap Forward, locking down centers that produce a lot of the country's GDP is a risk too.