Good point. As near as I can tell, China has 4,000-something total dead from Covid!
The problem with this bizarre theory is, of course, that China already has maximum control of its society. They have no need to enact lockdowns for control. They are maxed out on control.
What they have is the original owner’s manual of the virus. The way they are behaving suggests they know things the rest of the world does not — perhaps the mutation schedule and how bad the next will be. Their numbers justify their extreme measures only if that is the situation. They know what comes next.
It ain’t control. They have more societal control than even Myanmar. They are maxed out on that. This is about something they know about the virus.