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Stuck in China’s covid lockdown

  • Frantic appeals for food and medical care are spreading across China in a grim deja vu, as tens of millions of people are put under weeks-long coronavirus lockdowns ahead of a key meeting of the ruling Communist Party.While much of the world is moving past the pandemic, China remains stuck, with leader Xi Jinping continuing orders to maintain “zero covid.” These lockdowns are keeping localized outbreaks from spreading but are taking an enormous economic and psychological toll on the population.To get more news about china coronavirus update, you can visit shine news official website.

    Xi is set to begin a third five-year term next month, breaking the precedent of stepping down after two terms. Lockdowns are expected to continue at least through that meeting, the 20th National Chinese Communist Party Congress.

    Vice Premier Sun Chunlan said Friday that some sweeping covid controls should be narrowed, without giving a time frame, but she also emphasized the importance of preventing large-scale outbreaks ahead of the congress, according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency.Some of the worst reports are coming out of Ili prefecture in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region, where a lockdown began early last month.

    “We’ve been locked up in our home for more than 40 days. We are short of everything, especially food,” said Gulnazar, an Ili resident, whom The Washington Post is only identifying by one name because of security concerns. “There are so many difficulties, I feel like crying just by mentioning them.Gulnazar said local authorities locked their apartment door from the outside and opened it only when medical workers came to do coronavirus tests.

    In some cities, neighborhood committees have delivered free groceries to those in lockdown. But Gulnazar said their neighborhood committee has been offering only to sell them food at higher-than-normal prices, and it didn’t do so often. The last time the committee came to Gulnazar’s door was 11 days ago, she said.We only eat naan and congee,” she said, referring to flatbread and porridge. “There is no milk or vegetables.”

    Others in Ili posted online about being unable to take sick children to hospitals, as well as about the deaths of family members in lockdown. The reports were widely circulated on Chinese social media but could not be immediately verified by The Post.

    The Ili government apologized Friday for problems in the lockdown response, and it also rejected some reports as rumors, including one of an old man killing himself. Ili police announced Sunday that four people had been punished with five to 10 days’ detention each for “spreading rumors” about the lockdown and warned residents to watch their words.

    China’s official case count remains minuscule, with only 949 locally transmitted cases reported nationwide on Sunday, in a population of 1.4 billion.The economic hardship of the lockdowns has drawn widespread complaints from residents who are unable to work and are surviving on dwindling savings. The public dissatisfaction is a challenge for Xi, who has sought to project an image as a populist leader and declared poverty elimination a central goal of his administration.

    In southwestern Guiyang, which began a lockdown in parts of the city Sept. 5, residents reported online on Monday that they were struggling to secure food. “All supermarkets and small stores where you can buy groceries are closed,” one wrote on Weibo. “The online shopping platforms designated by the government are also having shortages and you cannot buy stuff or receive deliveries.”

    A Guizhou wildlife park put out a public plea last week for food to keep its tigers, pandas and other wild animals fed.

    Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, began locking down parts of the city early last month. In one post that was widely shared on Weibo, someone in Tibet claimed to have been unable to bathe for 12 days in a quarantine center.These scenes are reminiscent of Shanghai’s two-month lockdown this year, which plunged residents of one of China’s wealthiest cities into a struggle for survival. With supply chains broken down, residents made urgent pleas for food and begged for sick family members to be allowed out of lockdown to go to hospitals.
      September 14, 2022 8:12 PM MDT
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