China’s “Covid Zero” Policy Raises Complaints, But Beijing Refuses to Give Up

A video has gone viral on social media platform Weibo showing a young Chinese woman, on her balcony, screaming in despair after her building was ordered to close.

Fighting back tears, she shouts insults at workers in protective suits that seem to encapsulate the Chinese public’s growing frustration with the uncompromising policy of Covid Zero of your government.

The woman has been in quarantine for half a year, since returning from university in the summer, she yells at the workers. They look back, seemingly impassive.

While most Asian economies — even those that have previously adopted Covid Zero postures — are abandoning pandemic-era restrictions, officials in China remain zealous, repeatedly insisting this week in state media articles that the battle against the virus continues.” winnable”. ”

That claim comes even as infections rise and a new strain circulates just days before the country’s most important political event, the Communist Party Congress starting in Beijing on Sunday, in which Xi Jinping is expected to cement his place as the world’s most powerful leader. country in decades.

Officials around the world will be watching the meeting for signs of the party’s priorities when it comes to its zero Covid stance, which has been blamed for exacerbating growing problems in the economy, from stagnant growth to a collapsing housing market.

Nerves are running high in China’s capital, where photos posted online on Thursday appeared to show an exceptionally rare public protest against Xi.

“Say no to Covid testing, yes to food. No to confinement, yes to freedom. No to lies, yes to dignity. No to the cultural revolution, yes to reform. No to the great leader, yes to the vote. Don’t be a slave, be a citizen,” read a banner hanging from an overpass, despite heightened security around Congress.

However, all signs are that even in the face of growing public discontent, Xi and his party plan to stick to the zero Covid approach, possibly until 2023, with state media articles this week serving to dampen speculation that the country can change position.

Lockdown, test, repeat

More than 300 million people in dozens of cities in China were affected by total or partial lockdowns at one point last month, according to calculations by the CNN .

But as restrictions are lifted and imposed in response to local Covid outbreaks, the virus continues to resurge.

And new outbreaks reported across the country this week suggest that more misery may be on the way for China’s citizens — like the woman in the Weibo video — who have been exhausted by a seemingly endless cycle of lockdowns.

The city recorded 47 cases of Covid-19 on Thursday (13), a day after authorities ordered six of its 13 districts to close entertainment venues such as internet cafes, cinemas and bars. Shanghai Disney Resort has suspended some of its attractions and live performances since Sunday.

Frightened by the possibility of unpredictable and unannounced instant lockdowns – and aware that authorities had already backtracked after suggesting such measures were not coming – some people in the city were hoarding drinking water.

This panic buying was compounded by the announcement that Shanghai’s water authorities had taken steps to ensure water quality after discovering saltwater inflows into two reservoirs at the mouth of the Yangtze River in September.

Exactly what is driving the rise in infections is unclear, although authorities are struggling to contain the spread of the BF.7 coronavirus strain after it was first detected in China in late September in Hohhot, the capital of Inner Mongolia. .

The country has also seen a rise in cases in domestic tourist destinations, despite its strict restrictions discouraging people from traveling or spending on China’s Golden Week holiday in early October.

Hohhot reported 329 cases on Thursday, according to the National Health Commission, which now considers the remote region a high-risk location.

More than 240,000 university students in Inner Mongolia have been locked up on campuses due to the latest outbreak, according to Zhang Xiaoying, deputy director of the Regional Department of Education.

And the campus outbreak has led to punitive action, with a Communist Party chief at the university being fired after 39 students at his institution tested positive.

Then there is the situation in the far west of Xinjiang, where an estimated 22 million people have been banned from leaving the region and are forced to stay at home. Xinjiang reported 403 new cases on Thursday, according to an official count.

However, amidst all this, Beijing seems reluctant to leave its hardline stance. For three days this week, the state spokesman for the Communist People’s Daily Party posted comments reiterating that China would not let its guard down.

“Lying down is not advisable,” he said in his third comment on Wednesday, referring to a Chinese phrase that denotes complacency.

The battle against Covid was winnable, he insisted. Other countries that reopened and eased restrictions did so because they had no choice, he said, as they failed to “effectively control the epidemic in a timely manner.”