What Happened: The minutes of China's Dec. 21 National Health Commission meeting leaked on the Chinese social media platform WeChat, and they estimate that as many as 248 million people — nearly 18% of China's population — have caught COVID-19 so far in December, Bloomberg reported Dec. 23. Nearly 37 million people are estimated to have been infected on Dec. 20 alone, with three provinces having more than 20 million infections, three having more than 10 million and an additional five cities having more than 5 million.

Why It Matters: These figures reveal that China is in for several months of a severe health crisis, portending major economic disruptions in China's major cities and most populated areas, including Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Tianjin and others. This is in part due to the fact that government restrictions have eased to the point of near nonexistence; asymptomatic and low-symptom people, who just weeks ago would have been placed in isolated quarantine camps, are now encouraged to go to work. China's rapid viral spread also poses the risk of spawning new strands of COVID-19 that could traverse the globe, a concern U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken shared with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in a Dec. 22 phone call.

Background: Some locales have infection rates higher than 50%. These behind-closed-door numbers are far larger than recent official daily tallies of around 3,000-4,000 that the Chinese government has published.