The megacity of Shanghai, in western China, leaves this Wednesday (1st) the strict lockdown that lasted for two months for most of its 25 million inhabitants. Civil servants began to dismantle police fences and barriers around residential complexes and administrative buildings, which became part of the local urban landscape.
Restrictions will be eased for about 22.5 million people — a contingent similar to the population of Minas Gerais — who live in regions considered to be at low risk. Residents will be able to circulate on public roads and go to work in person, but the mask is still a mandatory item. Dining in restaurants remains prohibited, and stores can only operate at 75% of their usual capacity.
The policy of mass testing, although relieved, remains: using public transport will require passengers to always have the negative result of a test for the detection of Covid carried out in the last 72 hours. Those infected with the coronavirus and those who have had contact with them will have to quarantine.
The exit from the lockdown was communicated in the second half of May, when the number of new daily infections decreased. Officials even announced that Covid zero – a strategy by Beijing that seeks to eliminate the spread of the virus, rather than living with it – has been hit in Shanghai, as new cases with symptoms were not reported outside the areas that were under quarantine.
This Monday (30), the megacity reported 35 cases of Covid – 13 in patients with symptoms and 22 in asymptomatic people. The figure is the lowest since March. At the height of the local spread of the virus, in April, more than 27,000 cases were reported daily, although the bulk of the figure was related to asymptomatic people.
The Chinese methodology, which differs from that adopted by most Western nations, is made possible by the mass testing carried out in places that observe outbreaks of the disease. Even in the weeks in which the highest figures were reported, symptomatic cases accounted for, at most, a 15% share of total infections.
Deputy Mayor Zong Ming said the city is now entering what is the third phase of deflation — “a complete but gradual return to normalcy,” he said. Yin Xin, a spokesperson for the local administration, characterized the moment as “a day we have dreamed of for a long time”. “Everyone has sacrificed a lot,” she added.
For weeks, Shanghai was responsible for almost all deaths from Covid recorded in the Asian country. In the last four days, no deaths had been recorded – the last was on Thursday (26), according to the National Health Commission.
The end of the lockdown, of course, was celebrated by residents of the Chinese financial hub, but there were also reports of dissatisfaction with the way the Beijing regime dealt with the pandemic. During the two months of strict quarantine, there were numerous criticisms that, breaking through blocks on social networks, pointed to food shortages and disorganization in the confinement centers.
“Shanghai administration needs to make a public apology to win back the support of the population and repair the broken ties between the government and the people,” Qu Weiguo, a professor at Fudan University, wrote on the WeChat platform, according to the news agency. Reuters.
Residents also report a lack of centralized communication. Blogger Zhang Pei, in an article that went viral on WeChat, said she didn’t know how to respond to friends from elsewhere who sent messages celebrating the end of the lockdown. She and her family, who live in Shanghai, remain confined. “We feel that we live in a parallel world, we don’t know who has returned to work, nor where the business was reopened,” she said.
“Today is the 62nd day that I have been locked up, in confinement. Yesterday, the neighborhood committee asked us to do [testes] antigen at 8 am; at 10 am, we went to do [testes] of nucleic acid, and at 17:00, new antigens. With the same goal as every day: to find the virus,” she reported.
The Global Times, a newspaper linked to the centenary Chinese Communist Party, painted another scene, one of full celebration, among the residents. With a text that compiles accounts of residents speaking of relief and happiness, he said that Shanghai was used, by the international media, to “throw mud at China’s Covid zero policy and minimize the country’s economic development”.
According to the publication, at least 200,000 people in the city remain confined. The People’s Liberation Army, the name of the Chinese Armed Forces, which had been sent to the city, announced that it had fulfilled its programmed objective and must now withdraw.
The deconfinement of Chinese finance comes just months before the National People’s Congress, the Chinese legislature, decides whether to keep Xi Jinping at the head of the country or replace him – after Beijing abolished the limits for reelection in 2018.
Timing matters because the consequences of Shanghai’s isolation – not only popular dissatisfaction, but also the drop in economic indices – were read by local analysts as political attrition that could interfere with Xi’s stay in power.
