China only counting COVID-19 deaths due to respiratory failure

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China has tightened its definition of COVID-19-related deaths, only counting respiratory failure toward its total count.

After caving to protester demands and rolling back pandemic-related restrictions, China will only consider death due to respiratory complications in infected patients in the official COVID-19 death toll.

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A woman shows her health check QR code as residents line up to get their routine COVID-19 throat swabs at a coronavirus testing site, Dec. 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)

China's National Health Commission announced the change Tuesday via a briefing in Beijing.

China previously held some of the world’s toughest COVID-19 restrictions and claimed to have maintained a near-zero death rate since the start of the global pandemic in 2019. China lifted the restrictions earlier this month following riots and public protests.

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A person holds a banner during a protest in solidarity over the COVID-19 restrictions in mainland China during a commemoration of the victims of a fire in Urumqi outside the Chinese consulate in Toronto Nov. 29, 2022. (REUTERS/Chris Helgren)

The newly announced guidelines share a glimpse of behind-the-scenes decisions that have kept the country's pandemic numbers drastically lower than other nations. China has only reported a total of 5,242 COVID-19 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic in 2019.

For comparison, the United States officially reports having over 1.1 million COVID deaths, which included a stretch from Dec. 2021 to Jan. 2021, when it averaged thousands of deaths per day.

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A pandemic prevention worker wears a protective suit as he checks personal details of a woman lining up to get a swab test at a testing booth as outbreaks of COVID-19 continue in Beijing Nov. 3, 2022.  (REUTERS/Thomas Peter)

In Europe, the U.K. reports having just under 200,000 deaths; Italy reports having just over 180,000 deaths; France and Germany report having approximately 160,000 deaths each; and Spain and Portugal report having 116,000 and 25,000, respectively, according to Worldometers. 

Fox News' Lawrence Richard contributed to this report.