The death of a four-month-old baby in central China has stoked public anger on social media as frustrations mount over Beijing’s stringent “dynamic zero Covid” policy, which has confined millions to their homes and sparked angry protests. The girl died after suffering vomiting and diarrhoea while in quarantine at a hotel in the city of Zhengzhou, according to a post by her father, Li Baoliang, on China’s Twitter-like platform Weibo on Wednesday. Li had called an emergency hotline for help after his daughter vomited repeatedly in the early hours of…
Tag: Infectious diseases
China braces for wave of workers fleeing iPhone factory in Covid-hit Zhengzhou
Cities in central China have hastily drawn up plans to isolate migrant workers fleeing to their home towns from the country’s largest iPhone factory, amid fears they will spread coronavirus after leaving the plant in Covid-hit Zhengzhou. Videos shared on Chinese social media showed people who are allegedly workers at the Foxconn plant climbing over fences and carrying their belongings along a road. It was previously reported that a number of workers had been placed under quarantine because of an outbreak of the disease. Foxconn, a supplier to Apple that…
Reports of teenager dying in Covid quarantine cause outcry in China
Reports that a 16-year-old girl has died in a Covid quarantine centre after pleas from her family for medical help were ignored have caused anger in China, where ongoing tight pandemic controls have started to take their toll on a weary population. Videos of the girl have spread across Chinese social media in the last 24 hours. The distressing footage, which the Guardian has not been able to independently verify, shows the teenager ill, struggling to breathe and convulsing in a bunk bed at what is purported to be a…
Monkeypox: don’t touch foreigners, says China health chief, as first case reported
A senior Chinese health official has advised people to avoid physical contact with foreigners to prevent possible monkeypox infection after the first known case of the virus on mainland China was reported on Friday. “To prevent possible monkeypox infection and as part of our healthy lifestyle, it is recommended that 1) you do not have direct skin-to-skin contact with foreigners,” Wu Zunyou, chief epidemiologist at the China Centers for Disease Control and Prevention posted on his official Weibo page on Saturday. Wu also called for people to avoid “skin-to-skin contact”…
Xinjiang lockdown: Chinese censors drown out posts about food and medicine shortages
Chinese censors have reportedly been ordered to flood social media with innocuous posts about Xinjiang to drown out mounting complaints of food and medication shortages in a region under lockdown for more than a month. The Ili Kazakh autonomous prefecture, also known as Yili, is home to about 4.5 million people, and is believed to have been first put into lockdown in early August, without official public announcement, after an outbreak of Covid-19. In recent days social media has hosted reams of post about food shortages, delays or refusals of…
Chinese city’s residents made to queue for Covid tests in heat above 40C
Residents of the south-western Chinese city of Chongqing have been queueing on the streets to be tested for Covid, despite extreme temperatures that have soared past 40C (104F) this week. Photos posted on Chinese social media also showed health workers testing residents while wearing full hazmat suits in the heatwave. Other images showed that the tests were being carried out while bushfires raged in the background, prompting descriptions of the situation as “apocalyptic”. The city of more than 31 million people reported eight new confirmed Covid cases on Friday. Authorities…
China imposes Covid lockdown in Xi’an after handful of cases
Businesses, schools and restaurants in Xi’an will close for one week, officials have said, after the Chinese city logged a handful of Covid-19 cases as outbreaks nationwide strain Beijing’s zero-tolerance virus approach. China is the last major economy wedded to a zero-Covid strategy, deploying snap lockdowns, quarantines and travel curbs in a bid to weed out new infections. Xi’an, a historic city of 13 million that endured a month-long lockdown at the end of last year, has reported 18 cases since Saturday in a cluster driven by the fast-spreading Omicron…
Alarm in Beijing after announcement zero-Covid policy may last five years
Authorities in Beijing have sparked confusion and alarm after announcing the strict zero-Covid policy could be in place for the next five years, including mass mandatory testing and travel restrictions. The notice, published on Monday afternoon, was attributed to Cai Qi, the Beijing secretary of the Chinese Communist party. The original text said: “In the next five years, Beijing will unremittingly grasp the normalisation of epidemic prevention and control.” The notice was first posted by Beijing Daily and republished by other state media outlets. It spread widely across social media,…
Heaven Supermarket: the Beijing bar at centre of Covid outbreak
Heaven Supermarket’s ability to attract young Chinese customers and foreigners has always been viewed with envy by its competitor bars in the Chinese capital. Located in one of the busiest nightlife districts in Beijing, the bar is modelled as a large self-service liquor store with chairs, sofas and tables. It is not the fanciest in its presentation, but on Chinese review websites, patrons highlight its affordability and down-to-earth attitude. Bono Lee, a Hong Kong culture critic who lived in the area between 2008 and 2012, once wrote of Heaven Supermarket:…
Shanghai reopens after two months of Covid lockdown – in pictures
Restrictions have eased and more than 22 million people are allowed to move around the city again Main image: People drink on a street, as the city prepares to end the lockdown placed to curb the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Shanghai Photograph: Aly Song/Reuters Wed 1 Jun 2022 01.46 EDT The Guardian