City overcomes corona onslaught

During the 76-day lockdown, the city struggled to save lives and contain the virus, while maintaining the daily lives of ordinary people

HUBEI, China (Global Times) — A year ago, Wuhan, where the coronavirus was first reported in China, made a decision that has until then little parallel in modern society: To lock down the city of 11 million.

During the 76-day lockdown, the city struggled to save lives and contain the virus, while maintaining the daily lives of ordinary people, a strategy that Chinese top epidemiologists said was done to “suffocate the virus within Wuhan.”

Many Wuhan people, initially puzzled by their government’s decision to seal off the city, became staunch supporters of the move.

The city was therefore dubbed a “heroic city,” whose sacrifice paved the way for the quick recovery of the country.

When the city returned to bustling normal life in April, and Western countries, one by one, faced a more severe onslaught of the coronavirus, many Wuhan people, initially puzzled by their government’s decision to seal off the city, became staunch supporters of the move. A year has passed; what impression has the lockdown left on Wuhan people and what’s their message for countries that once ridiculed Wuhan’s lockdown?

Start of crisis

For most Wuhan residents, the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) pandemic that upended lives across the globe, started on 23 January 2020, the day the Wuhan government announced to seal off the city of 11 million people.

The decision to lockdown initially puzzled many locals, who soon turned into firm supporters after seeing the city bounce back fast from its Covid-19 swoon while some Western countries, one-by-one, dragged their feet on responding to the brewing crisis.

Now, Wuhan’s lockdown measures have become the template in quelling the coronavirus worldwide. China, which has bounced back fastest and strongest from the pandemic, has refined virus control methods to a “precise virus prevention mode,” where small outbreaks were contained one by one, with economic recovery barely affected.

Countries like the US, which have been through several rounds of lockdowns, are still facing an onslaught of Covid-19, and the daily deaths of thousands almost became a new normal there.

PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF GLOBAL TIMES ON 20 January, the streets of Wuhan were decorated with 30,000 red lanterns for the Spring Festival holiday and bear no marks of the pandemic that started in the city a year ago.