Shanghai releases 11,000 covid-19 patients
BEIJING — Shanghai on Sunday discharged over 11,000 recovered covid-19 patients, and health authorities emphasized that they must be allowed to return home despite the lockdown that has restricted movement in China’s largest city.
“We hope their family and community will not worry about them or discriminate against them,” said Wu Jinglei, director of the Shanghai Health Commission.
The city of 26 million people reported 1,006 confirmed infections and nearly 24,000 asymptomatic cases in the past 24 hours. Shanghai has been under lockdown since March 28, and authorities said Saturday that the strict measures would be lifted in areas with no new cases in the past 14 days after another round of mass testing.
The United States on Saturday advised its citizens to reconsider traveling to China due to “arbitrary enforcement” of local laws and covid-19 restrictions, particularly in Hong Kong, Jilin province and Shanghai. U.S. officials cited a risk of “parents and children being separated.”
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said in response that China was “strongly dissatisfied with and firmly opposed to the U.S. side’s groundless accusation against China’s epidemic response.”
“It should be pointed out that China’s anti-epidemic policies are science-based and effective, and we are fully confident that Shanghai and other places in China will prevail over the new wave of the epidemic,” Zhao said.
Meanwhile, Shanghai authorities said they have secured daily supplies for residents from online platforms, according to state-owned newspaper Global Times, after complaints about deliveries of food and other basic necessities as the lockdown enters its third week.
Posts circulating on social media platforms such as Weibo also show that some residents have not been able to have their food orders delivered, while others posted online that they’re running out of food.
Some people said that as soon as a person goes to the grocery shopping app, a day’s orders are already filled.
According to the Global Times, platforms such as JD.com as well as Alibaba’s Ele.me delivery apps are working with authorities to ensure that everyone has access to vegetables, fruits and other produce.
China is facing one of its worst local outbreaks since the pandemic began. China is still closed to international travel, even as most of the world has sought ways to live with the virus.