What is expected for China's SARS-CoV-2 epidemic?

TL;DR

This paper estimates the potential fatalities from China's SARS-CoV-2 epidemic post-zero-covid policy, considering vaccination effects and demographic factors, projecting up to 2.4 million deaths under worst-case scenarios.

Contribution

It provides a simple model to estimate COVID-19 fatalities in China based on vaccination efficacy, demographic data, and potential waning immunity, offering projections under different scenarios.

Findings

Estimated 1.1 million deaths with current vaccination protection.

Most deaths (60%) are among males.

84% of deaths occur in individuals aged 55 or older.

Abstract

Recently, China announced that its "zero-covid" policy would end, which will bring serious challenges to the country's health system. In here we provide simple calculations that allows us to provide an estimate of what is expected as an outcome in terms of fatalities, using the fact that it is a highly contagious disease that will expose most of a highly vaccinated population to the virus. We use recent findings regarding the amount of reduction in the risk of severe outcome achieved by vaccination and arrive to an estimate of 1.1 m deaths, 60% of these are males. In our model, 84% percent of deaths occur in individuals with age 55 years or older. In a scenario in which this protection is completely lost due to waning and the infection fatality rate of the prevalent strain reaches similar levels to the observed in the beginning of the epidemic, the death toll could reach 2.4 m, 93% in 55 years or older.