China’s COVID-19 cases rose further yesterday, including in the capital, Beijing, even as many cities scaled back routine testing after authorities last week announced measures aimed at easing the impact of the country’s heavy coronavirus curbs.
China is scrambling to limit the damage of its “zero COVID-19” policy nearly three years into the pandemic, as the latest in a spate of dismal economic reports showed retail sales fell last month and factory output grew more slowly than expected.
While many residents have expressed guarded optimism after Friday’s announcement that some of the stringent COVID-19 policies would be eased, concerns grew this week over the worsening outbreaks and there was confusion as some cities halted or adjusted regular testing.
Photo: EPA-EFE
In Guangzhou, a southern city of nearly 19 million people, new infections crossed 5,000 for the first time, fueling speculation that district-level lockdowns could expand.
“The infection curve of Guangzhou is tracking the pace of Shanghai’s March-April outbreak, raising the question of whether a city-wide lockdown will be triggered,” JPMorgan analysts wrote, referring to Shanghai’s two-month lockdown this year.
“It would become a testing point regarding the government’s determination to push for the relaxation of COVID control measures,” they said.
China reported 17,772 new local COVID-19 infections for Monday, up from 16,072 new cases a day earlier and the most since April, with major cities, including Chongqing and Zhengzhou, among the worst-hit.
JPMorgan estimates that cities with more than 10 new cumulative cases in the past week are home to 780 million people and account for 62.2 percent of GDP — roughly triple the levels seen at the end of September.
On Monday, Beijing’s most populous district of Chaoyang, where most of its cases are located, moved some testing sites closer to residential compounds.
While that increased the overall number of sites, it also led to long waiting times in many cases, fueling frustration, as many workplaces and other venues still require negative test results from within 24 hours.
ONLINE CRITICISM
On Sina Weibo, a hashtag on testing booth closures was flooded with critical comments on Monday night before being censored: “What are working people supposed to do?” wrote one Weibo user. Another asked: “What kind of brain came up with this policy?”
Yesterday, state broadcaster CCTV said Chaoyang district was adding more testing sites, including near office buildings.
Beijing reported 462 new infections for Monday, up from 407 a day earlier.
Under China’s new rules, testing efforts are to be more targeted, easing what has been a significant financial burden on cities.
Friday’s easing announcement sparked a rally in stocks on hopes that China is signaling plans to end a policy that has all but shut its borders and caused frequent lockdowns, possibly starting after the annual session of parliament in March next year.
However, experts have said that full reopening would require a massive vaccination booster effort, given low levels of herd immunity resulting from China’s isolation during the pandemic.
It would also require a change in messaging, they said, in a country where catching COVID-19 is widely feared.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS