As China seeks to live with the virus, Covid-control industries face decline

BEIJING - Like most Chinese, Beijing resident Wang was happy and relieved when she heard last week that China was dropping almost all of its zero-Covid policy curbs. A day later though, the 43-year-old lost her job as one of the city’s many hazmat-suited Covid-19 swab testers.

That U-turn has meant a change in fortunes overnight for those companies as well as firms involved in quarantining, Covid-tracking and movement-monitoring products and services. Some less conservative estimates had even put this year’s potential cost of mass-testing alone - with commuters in big cities requiring negative tests every one or two days - at 1.5 per cent to 1.8 per cent of China’s gross domestic product - more than Qatar’s GDP.

Some also dropped plans to buy software that tracks the spread of Covid-19 or alarms for doors of people under lockdown to monitor if they left their homes. Over time, the return to more normal economic activity should help more people find jobs. Local governments are also expected to divert resources into coping with Covid-19.

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