Strict ‘prison-like’ lockdowns in China fuel rare expressions of public anger

CHINA’S two largest cities, Beijing and Shanghai, tightened Covid-19 curbs yesterday, fuelling public angst and even questions about the legality of its uncompromising battle with the virus that has battered the world’s second-largest economy.

In Shanghai, enduring its sixth week of lockdown, authorities have launched a new push to end infections outside quarantine zones by late May.

Residents in at least four of Shanghai’s 16 districts received notices at the weekend saying they would not be allowed to leave their homes or receive deliveries, prompting a scramble to stock up on food. Some of these people had previously been allowed to move around their residential compounds.

“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.

Meanwhile, in the most severe restrictions imposed in Beijing so far, an area in the south-west of the capital yesterday forbade residents from leaving their areas and ordered all activities not related to virus prevention to halt.

In other badly hit districts of Beijing, residents have been told to work from home, some restaurants and public transport have closed, and additional roads, compounds and parks were sealed off yesterday.

The restrictions have taken a heavy toll on China’s economy. The curbs have also fuelled rare expressions of public anger, further inflamed by recent online accounts of authorities in Shanghai forcing neighbours of Covid-19-positive cases into centralised quarantine and demanding that they hand over the keys to their homes to be disinfected.

China is adamant that it will stick to its zero-Covid policy to fight a disease that first emerged in the city of Wuhan in late 2019. Authorities have warned against criticism of a policy they say is saving lives.

Shanghai reported a drop in new cases for the 10th straight day.

Beijing has been hoping to avoid the weeks of lockdowns that Shanghai has endured but the growing number of residential buildings under lockdown is unnerving residents.