TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) – China’s success in controlling the coronavirus outbreak has resulted in a population that seemed almost reluctant to get vaccinated. That’s why it’s speeding up its vaccination campaign by offering incentives – free eggs, store coupons, and discounts on groceries and merchandise – to those who get a chance.
After a slow start, China now gives millions of shots a day. On March 26 alone, it took 6.1 million shots. A top government doctor, Zhong Nanshan, announced a goal in June to vaccinate 560 million of the country’s 1.4 billion people.
Part of the challenge lies in the enormity of the effort and the need to convince a population that currently feels safe from infections.
When patients first showed up at hospitals in Wuhan in late 2019 with fever, cough and breathing difficulties, the government shut down the city and others in Hubei province for more than two months from January 2020. Wuhan later became known as the epicenter of the outbreak.
Since then, China has kept the virus under control through strict border controls and quick locks when new outbreaks arise. People can eat out in restaurants and the risk of infection is low, so many don’t seem to be in a hurry to get the vaccine.
“I think everyone has a sense of safety and comfort, and you don’t have to rush to get vaccinated unless you’re asked to,” said Helen Chen, a health care specialist at a market research firm in Shanghai.
But China also wants to open up as the world tries to return to its pre-pandemic norm and Beijing prepares to welcome tens of thousands of visitors to host the Winter Olympics in February 2022. Although successful with rapid lockdowns and a robust contact tracking system via smartphones, the government is also weighing these measures in balance with a possible return to normalcy.
For now, the government in major cities like Shanghai and Beijing is relying mainly on continuous messaging and freebies to convince people to get vaccinated.
Shopping centers have offered points at stores or coupons. A temple in Beijing offered free entry to anyone who presented proof of vaccination. Shanghai uses buses in its campaign to set up mobile vaccination points.
And then there are the free eggs.
“Good news. Starting today, residents 60 and older who have received their first injection will be eligible for five ‘jin’ (2.5 kilograms or 5 1/2 pounds) of eggs. said a poster from a city-run health center in Beijing.
Wang Feng was too young for the eggs from the clinic, but the 25-year-old chief said he was given the vaccine anyway because he couldn’t go to work without it.
“I thought if it worked, it might as well,” he added.
Some people have expressed doubts about how good the existing vaccines are, Chinese or not, given the speed at which they were developed.
“I don’t think such an effective vaccine can be made so quickly,” said Amy Lu, who works at a university in Shanghai.
The five vaccines currently in use in China have an efficacy range of 50.7% to 79.3%, based on what the companies have said. That doesn’t mean they have no value – most experts say anything above 50% is helpful in getting the pandemic under control, along with preventing hospitalizations and deaths.
“Even if everyone gets two doses, you may not get herd immunity.” said Wang Chenguang, a former professor at Peking Union Medical College and an immunology expert. Herd immunity occurs when enough of the population has immunity, either against vaccinations or previous infections, to stop the uncontrolled spread of an infectious disease.
China may need to vaccinate at least 1 billion people to achieve that, Wang Huaqing, a top immunology official at China’s Center for Disease Control, said in an interview with state media this week. By early April, about 34 million people had received two injections and about 65 million received one dose.
Gao Fu, the head of the CDC, said last weekend that China is considering different strategies such as mixing different vaccines to increase effectiveness. External experts say China could eventually deploy other, more effective vaccines, such as the Pfizer or Moderna injections.
“The best you can do is actually allow the use of other, better vaccines and make them available to the Chinese people, but that’s probably a big political challenge,” said Jin Dong-yan, an expert in the field. of vaccines at the University of Hong. Kong’s medical school.
Chinese drug manufacturer Fosun Pharmaceutical Group has partnered with Germany’s BioNTech to sell the Pfizer vaccine in China. However, it is only approved in Hong Kong and Macao, special areas of China with their own regulatory bodies. A clinical trial for approval in the mainland is underway.
Vaccination should be voluntary, but overzealous efforts by some local governments and businesses have prompted health officials to issue a warning against forced vaccinations this week.
A hospital in Danzhou in the southern island province of Hainan apologized after sending a message to staff saying, “Those who have not been vaccinated can be fired.”
In Zhejiang province, an April 2 announcement said all government departments, Communist Party cadres, and people working at universities should take the lead in shooting.
The national government also demanded vaccination for all residents of Ruili, a border town with Myanmar, due to a recent outbreak.
Getting vaccinated can also mean avoiding some of the tougher obstacles some local institutions have put in place in the name of pandemic control.
Beijing student Bright Li said he had been vaccinated so he no longer needed approval to leave campus. Although barely enforced, Li was concerned after the university put up posters publicly denouncing a student who left campus without permission last winter after that student went to an area with a confirmed COVID-19 case.
The urge to vaccinate has been met with scattered shortages and delays.
In Haikou, the capital of Hainan, health authorities gave a temporary reprieve to give a second chance to those not involved in two major upcoming events, “due to the relative tightness” in the vaccine supply. Shortages were also reported in two southern cities, Foshan in Guangdong Province and Xiamen Port in Fujian Province.
China’s vaccine makers have greatly expanded production capacity, and health officials say they are confident that demand can be met by the end of the year.
Video producer Olivia Zhang of the Associated Press in Beijing, researcher Chen Si in Shanghai and science writer Aniruddha Ghosal in New Delhi contributed to this report.