China on Monday recorded more than 2,000 Covid cases, the highest in a month, as officials outside the Communist Party Congress imposed new lockdowns and restrictions to prevent outbreaks from spreading to the capital.
Although recent case numbers are small by global standards, Beijing’s strict zero-Covid policy means all outbreaks must be eradicated immediately.
President Xi Jinping, who is expected to serve an historic third term, has championed the policy, and any significant outburst ahead of the opening of Congress on Sunday would prove extremely embarrassing for the party.
Tens of thousands of people were placed under lockdown in Shanghai on Monday after several neighborhoods suddenly shut down over the weekend after 23 new infections were detected on Friday.
According to a government briefing, over 2,100 households in the financial hub were affected on Sunday from just one infection.
Residents reacted with shock as green fences were erected around buildings, recalling the city’s strict two-month lockdown in the spring, which sparked widespread complaints about shortages of food and medical treatment.
As of Monday, Shanghai has nine “medium-risk” lockdowns in six districts, authorities said, but there are likely many more individual building lockdowns that have not been officially announced.
“After hearing about some situations, most people feel that it seems to have returned in April and May,” said a resident surnamed Li.
– travel chaos –
Other Chinese cities were also affected.
On Friday, the city of Yongji in northern Shanxi Province ordered a two-day lockdown of its three million residents after cases were found in a neighboring city — although Yongji itself did not record any new infections at all.
Some travelers arriving in Beijing said they received a notification on their Covid-tracking app requiring them to undergo multiple PCR tests to gain access to public spaces – despite coming from areas with no cases were.
And some Beijing residents who had traveled during last week’s long bank holiday were stranded after receiving a notification from the Covid-tracking app preventing them from boarding trains or flights back to the city.
Many left desperate pleas for help on the Weibo page of the official Beijing Citizens’ Phone, but those comments were censored on Monday.
Several tourist hotspots imposed lockdowns last week, including the city of Haikou in tropical Hainan province and Xishuangbanna in southern Yunnan province, where hundreds of angry tourists were stranded at an airport after flights were abruptly cancelled.
Northwest China’s Xinjiang also banned all people from leaving the region last week after an outbreak was identified, as local authorities made a rare public admission of failure to control the virus.
A recent news report about a Shanghai tourist stranded in Xinjiang who took a job harvesting grapes was later censored, while officials in one district last week urged tourists to “consider” local employment.
Domestic tourism revenue and daily passenger travel during the October holiday fell by over 55 percent and 58 percent, respectively, from pre-pandemic levels, Nomura analysts wrote in a statement.
