Shanghai announced on Tuesday that it has achieved “zero Covid” in all its regions, prompting a wave of sarcastic comments on social media at a time when millions of residents in major Chinese cities are still subject to lockdowns.
In the face of the largest Covid outbreak since it began, Chinese authorities imposed strict restrictions on the population of the city of 25 million in early April. China is still the last major economic power closed to the world.
The government’s insistence on rooting out the mutant Omicron outbreak sparked rare demonstrations and skirmishes with the authorities at a time when the people of Shanghai refused to subject them to long periods of shutdown due to food shortages. “All 16 districts in Shanghai have achieved zero local COVID-19 cases,” Shanghai Health Commissioner Zhao Dandan told reporters on Tuesday.
This means that none of the 1,000 new infections reported on Tuesday were detected outside of quarantine zones, according to city officials.
Vice Mayor Chen Tong said on Sunday that the city would gradually resume commercial activity from this week, without giving details. But on Tuesday, millions of people in Shanghai were still unable to leave their housing estates.
Officially, more than 3.8 million people are still in the strictest form of lockdown in the city, according to official figures. China’s strategy to achieve zero cases of COVID-19 includes strict border closures, lengthy quarantine measures, rapid and widespread testing, and targeted closures.
Comments circulated on social media expressing shock at the gap between official statements and the reality of life amid the prolonged closure. A user of the Weibo platform, which is the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, asked, “Since the community has reached zero Covid, why are the people of Songjiang still not only allowed to go outside every two days?” Another said, “Is this Shanghai in a parallel world?” In some areas of the city, restrictions have been tightened without fanfare.
A live broadcast shown by Chinese media on Tuesday showed a crowd gathered at Shanghai’s Hongqiao railway station as trains leaving the city resumed operations. Residents were only allowed to leave Shanghai after receiving permission and passing several tests for COVID-19.
And there is no sign that China is intent on abandoning its fight to maintain zero Covid infections despite mounting economic costs as a result of a downturn in the retail sector, home and auto sales and high unemployment. Beijing is conducting massive screenings of its residents almost every day as the number of infections has risen.
Millions of residents in the capital have been forced to work remotely and transportation services have been suspended for fear of a repeat of the chaos caused by the shutdown in Shanghai.
