After two months of frustration, despair and economic losses, the draconian blockade of Shanghai’s COVID-19 is largely over.
Key points:
- Some restrictions are still in place, with residents being required to wear masks in the public and prohibited dining room
- Residents will be required to take a test every 72 hours to take public transportation and enter public places
- Families separated and hundreds of thousands were forced into centralized quarantine facilities during confinement.
Most of Shanghai’s 25 million residents can now move out of their homes freely, return to work, use public transportation, and drive their cars, a time that for many in China’s largest and most cosmopolitan city seemed like would never arrive.
At midnight, small groups gathered in the old French concession district of the city, whistling, shouting “ban lifted” and clinking champagne glasses.
Previously, the streets were lively as residents picnicked in the grassy areas and children rode bicycles on roads without cars.
Dancing retirees, a nightly show common in Chinese cities, flaunted their belongings for the first time in months in outdoor squares and along the Huangpu River.
Officials, who set June 1 as the target date for the reopening in early May, appear ready to accelerate what has been a gradual relaxation in recent days.
“The epidemic has been effectively controlled,” said Deputy Mayor Zong Ming.
Lu Kexin, a high school student visiting the city’s waterfront area for the first time since late March, said she struggled to stay trapped at home for so long.
“I am very happy [to be out]”Very happy, even too happy,” he said. “I could die.”
Shanghai Disneyland, which has not yet announced a reopening date, aired a light show to “celebrate the lifting of the Shanghai blockade.”
He used a Chinese expression that also means “prohibition” that city officials have avoided.
Under the streetlights, barbers cut the hair of residents who had grown old during the blockade. On the social networking platform WeChat, stores announced their reopening plans.
“I walked the dog and the dog is pretty excited because it’s been a long time since he went outside,” said Melody Dong, who was looking forward to eating hot pot and barbecue, foods that are hard to make at home.
The lonely and empty cities of Shanghai came back to life when the residents were finally released. (Reutes: Aly Song)
Shanghai’s ordeal has come to symbolize what critics say is the unsustainability of China’s adherence to a zero-COVID policy that seeks to cut off all chains of infection, at any cost, even for much of the world is trying to return to normal despite ongoing infections.
The hardest part of the confinement was psychological, said Cao Yue, who has worked in Shanghai for five years.
He remembered the early days when it was hard to buy food and he didn’t know what to do.
“It was pretty depressing to be locked up at home and see all of Shanghai locked up,” he said.
More than half a million people in the city of 25 million will not be able to leave on Wednesday: 190,000 who are still in blockade zones and 450,000 more who are in control zones because they live near recent cases.
The lack of a roadmap to get out of an increasingly challenging approach by the highly contagious variant of Omicron has shaken investors and frustrated companies.
COVID-19 brakes in Shanghai and many other Chinese cities have affected the world’s second largest economy and entangled global supply chains, although the number of cases has improved and brakes have been reduced since the depths of the April blockades.
China says its approach, a policy signed by President Xi Jinping, is needed to save lives and prevent its health care system from collapsing.
The uncertainty and discontent caused by China’s management of COVID-19 has created unwanted turmoil in a sensitive political year, with Mr Xi about to secure a third leadership term in the fall.
“Tonight’s mood is a bit like high school days,” wrote one Twitter user, Weibo.
“The eve of the course was full of expectations for the new semester, but I feel a little uncomfortable in my heart.”
Shanghai registered 29 new cases on Monday, continuing a steady decline from more than 20,000 a day in April.
Beijing, the country’s capital, eased further restrictions in some districts on Tuesday.
The city has imposed limited blockades, but nothing close to a city-wide level, in a much smaller outbreak that appears to be declining.
According to local media reports, police are investigating three test labs in Beijing for “inadequate test protocols” that have allegedly led to inaccurate test results.
Workers began dismantling barriers around residential areas earlier in the week. (Reuters: Aly Song)
A marked city
For two months, many residents of the country’s largest financial and economic center struggled to get enough food or medical care.
Families separated and hundreds of thousands were forced into centralized quarantine facilities.
In the factories and offices that remained open, including those of Shanghai government officials, workers lived on the site in “closed cycles”, approached in makeshift beds, and many of them can only return home now.
The sidewalks were raised for about 22.5 million people in low-risk areas.
Residents still have to wear masks in public and avoid meetings. Food in the restaurant is still prohibited. Stores can operate at 75% capacity. The gyms will reopen later.
Residents will have to take tests every 72 hours to catch public transportation and enter public places, announcing what could become a “new normal” in many Chinese cities.
Those who test positive and their close contacts face onerous quarantines.
Residents who want to take public transportation or enter public buildings will still have to be tested regularly. (Reuters: Aly Song)
During the confinement, Shanghai residents staged rare protests, knocking pots and pans from the windows and dodging censors to vent on China’s heavily controlled social networks.
Frustrations stemmed from confinement itself, as well as harsh and often uneven application and unclear communication.
“The Shanghai government must apologize publicly for the understanding and support of the people of Shanghai and repair the damaged relationship between the government and the people,” said Qu Weiguo, a professor at the Foreign Language School of Shanghai. Fudan University. on WeChat.
On Tuesday, the city’s largest quarantine facility, a 50,000-bed section of the National Exhibition and Convention Center, registered the last two of the 174,308 positive COVID cases that had been housed there. It was declared closed.
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