From Sputnik
The starkly different impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on China and the United States is glaring proof of which political system is most capable of delivering for the common good of people.
Nearly one and half years since the global pandemic erupted, the total number of deaths in China from the disease stands at about 4,600. In the United States, the death toll is over 630,000 and rising.
China's deaths from COVID-19 are less than 1 percent of those in the US. What is even more remarkable is that China has a total population of 1.4 billion people which is four times that of the United States.
Any objective person looking at the data would therefore have to conclude that there is something hugely significant about the relative performances of the governing systems in both countries. Empirically, in managing a massive public health crisis, China has wiped the floor with the US.
The pandemic is a tragic demonstration of China's superiority over the US in terms of governance for the common good. Some critics may dispute if China has a socialist system. China claims it does. In any case, its system has strong elements of socialism: central planning, public ownership and state provision of services, in particular healthcare.
These characteristics have ensured that China's response to the pandemic has minimized the deaths and infirmities. This was evident from the early weeks of the pandemic when the Beijing government implemented rapid lockdowns and rigorous tracing methods to contain the disease.
Again, this can be seen currently in the way China is mobilizing resources to contain deadly new variants of the virus. The lockdowns, tracing, isolation and mask-wearing are proven to be effective in defeating the virus. But that response is made possible because China's government provides the financial and material resources to help the public cooperate. Free accommodation, food and other essentials are generously supplied to families so that they can comply with onerous restrictions.
By contrast, the United States is witnessing a non-stop disaster. There, the capitalist, oligarchic system completely disincentives public cooperation to help beat the pandemic. Yes, there have been some government handouts to workers and the unemployed.
But the response is paltry. By and large, working Americans can't afford isolation and lockdowns because they are expected to bear the costs, which in a profit-above-all system does not make it feasible to implement an effective strategy to contain the disease.
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