BEIJING/SHANGHAI: China is tightening pandemic restrictions in Shanghai and expanding a mass testing sweep in Beijing as officials chase the elusive goal of wiping out Covid-19 cases in the community.
The country reported 3,426 new infections for Monday, the lowest daily tally since March 16. Cases in Shanghai, where the biggest outbreak remains underway, fell to a six week low of 3,014 after peaking at more than 27,000 a day in mid-April. In Beijing, new infections rose to 74, though they have yet to exceed 100-a-day in the current flare-up.
Despite the low numbers, authorities are ramping up curbs. Some Shanghai neighborhoods have announced "quiet periods," where residents aren't allowed to go outside and deliveries are curbed, while more people are being shipped off to government-run isolation centers under a new definition of what it means to be a close contact. In Beijing, areas beyond the biggest district Chaoyang are instituting rounds of mass testing with schools in the capital to remain shut.
'Like a prison'
In Shanghai, enduring its sixth week of lockdown, authorities have launched a new push to end infections outside quarantine zones by late May, according to people familiar with the matter.
"Go home, go home!" a woman shouted through a megaphone at residents mingling below an apartment block impacted by the new restrictions on Sunday, a scene that might baffle the rest of the world that has opted to open up and live with the virus.
"It was like a prison," said Coco Wang, a Shanghai resident living under the new restrictions. "We are not afraid of the virus. We are afraid of this policy."
Isolated from the world
The moves underscore the lengths officials will go to for a virus strategy that is leaving China isolated and out of step with the rest of the world, where Covid is now widespread. The country is continuing to try and eliminate the last vestiges of Covid in their cities, and the tighter restrictions and stepped-up moves suggest the lockdowns that have confined millions of residents to their homes for more than a month won't be eased soon.
A brigade of hundreds of volunteers dressed head-to-toe in protective gear are disinfecting the apartments of those who test positive, as well as the homes of neighbors who share kitchens or bathrooms, to further control the virus, officials said.
Uncertainties persist
Uncertainties persist around Beijing's virus situation, local health official Pang Xinghuo said at a Monday briefing. All regions in Chaoyang, Shunyi, Fangshan and other neighborhoods that found cases in the past seven days will conduct three rounds of mass Covid tests starting Tuesday, according to information shared at the press conference.
Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan on Monday reiterated the country's adherence to Covid Zero, saying outbreaks should be stamped out as soon as they are detected, Xinhua reported. She urged the importance of early warning, and stressed the availability of PCR tests within 15 minutes' walk in big cities.
China's Covid Zero policy requires all cases and their close contacts to be isolated in government facilities as a way of snuffing out transmission. The strategy was effective at quashing Covid early on in the pandemic, but is being challenged by more transmissible variants like omicron.
The country's ongoing pursuit of the strategy is leaving it increasingly isolated, with other parts of the world dismantling pandemic curbs and living alongside the virus, making the scenes in China all the more stark.
Extreme measures
The restrictions have taken a heavy toll on China's economy.
China's export growth slowed to its weakest in almost two years, data on Monday showed, as the central bank pledged to step up support for the slowing economy.
In a stark sign of the stresses for business, China's auto association estimated that sales last month dropped a staggering 48% year-on-year as Covid restrictions shut factories and crimped domestic demand.
The curbs have also fuelled rare expressions of public anger, further inflamed by recent online accounts of authorities in Shanghai forcing neighbours of Covid-positive cases into centralised quarantine and demanding that they hand over the keys to their homes to be disinfected.
One video showed police picking a lock after a resident refused to open a door.
In another, a voice recording of a call circulated on the internet of a woman arguing with officials demanding to spray disinfectant in her home even though she had tested negative. Reuters was not able to independently verify the videos.
