Virus death toll in China's capital shows further rise
BEIJING (AP) — The death toll in the latest COVID-19 surge in China’s capital Beijing has risen incrementally, as feverish clinic patients and an increase in the funeral business point to a widening outbreak after an easing of strict virus containment regulations.
Unofficial reports suggest a widespread wave of new coronavirus cases, and relatives of victims and people who work in the funeral business said deaths tied to COVID-19 were increasing. Those people spoke on condition of not being identified for fear of retribution, official policy and the direction of the latest outbreak remain cloaked in uncertainty and confusion.
The National Health Commission on Tuesday said five newly recorded fatalities, all in Beijing, had taken the country’s total death toll to 5,242 — relatively low by global standards but potentially set to increase substantially following moves by the government to step away from the “zero-COVID” policy of lockdowns, quarantines and compulsory testing that has staggered the economy and prompted rare anti-government protests.
With people testing and recuperating at home, China has said it is no longer possible to keep an accurate count of new case numbers, making it substantially more difficult to gauge the state of the current wave of infection and its direction. Some scientific models have estimated numbers will rise with an eventual death toll in the tens or hundreds of thousands.
China is trying to persuade reluctant seniors and others at risk to get vaccinated, apparently with only moderate success. Vaccination centers visited over recent days have been largely empty and there has been no major publicity drive in the entirely state-controlled media.
The other major concern is shoring up health resources in smaller cities and the vast rural...
