IMF warns China over cost of Covid lockdowns

IMF warns China over cost of Covid lockdowns

China, the world’s second largest economy, should review its zero-tolerance approach to the pandemic or risk damaging the global recovery, according to the head of International Monetary Fund.

Kristalina Georgieva said Beijing should reassess the use of lockdowns to limit the spread of the highly contagious Omicron variant since it became clear the harm to human health was less severe than the Delta variant.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum on a virtual panel, she said that while the hardline approach had contained the pandemic in China for “quite some time”, the restrictions were now proving to be a burden on the economy in China and globally.