Sunday Times 2
China locks down cities in province where coronavirus resurgence infects hundreds
View(s):Two Chinese cities in a province neighbouring the capital Beijing have been locked down to rein in a resurgence of hundreds of coronavirus infections for seven consecutive days now, after the ruling Communist Party had boasted for months of the success against the deadly new pathogen that emerged in Wuhan and continues to decimate lives and economies across the world.
Northern Hebei province confirmed on Saturday morning that 14 more local coronavirus patients (including a 3-year-old), and 16 who are not showing symptoms. Seven among the confirmed patients are seriously sick with the coronavirus disease, state media reports show.
All newly-infected people are in the Hebei province capital Shijiazhuang, which is home to about 11 million. Most are from Gaocheng district, declared a high-risk area. Hebei now has 137 recently confirmed virus patients and 197 who do not have symptoms.
Coronavirus infections have continued to spread from one rural village in Gaocheng District to eight counties and districts in downtown Shijiazhuang or its suburbs, state media reported. On Jan 2, a 61-year-old woman in Gaocheng in Shijiazhuang was infected. Infections are surging just about a month ahead of the Spring Festival holidays marking the Year of the Ox, when multiple millions will be on the move, posing greater risks.
Shijiazhuang, and another city, Xingtai, were locked down and more than 200 medical workers have been flown in from two provinces along with supplies.
On Saturday, the National Health Commission told people they should avoid travel during the Chinese New Year.
In Shijiazhuang, more than 4.8 million had been tested for the coronavirus and 289 people are positive, the deputy governor of Hebei said on Friday afternoon, state media reported.
Hebei is known for exports of agri produce (an estimated 290,000 hectares of farmland), and mechanical and electrical products. Counties including Yongqing, Gu’an and Xianghe of Langfang, are big suppliers of vegetables to Beijing.
Communist rulers fear that Hebei infections could engulf Beijing, which, in the 14 days to Monday, 28 December, alone, had diagnosed 9 Chinese who are infected. Three urban districts in Beijing tested thousands for the disease. This month, Beijing imposed a 21-day quarantine for incoming travelers. Even on January 7, Beijing detected an infected local. There were also virus outbreaks in June.
There have been coronavirus infections in northeast Liaoning province and southern Shenzhen as well. In Liaoning, an apartment complex and a housing estate in the capital, Shenyang, have now been declared medium-risk areas due to a resurgence of the infections. Shenyang has 17 medium-risk areas now.
In Hebei’s Shijiazhuang, 9 communities and villages are medium-risk areas, state media reported. On Friday, medium risk areas were also declared in five communities and villages in Nangong city in Xingtai city.
The Communist state media reports that the origin of the Hebei virus flare-up has not been identified.
Residents are not allowed to move in Shijiazhuang, flights are halted, vehicles are banned, along with rail and road transport, including long-distance buses. Only essential services are allowed. Buses and the subway were shut down this Saturday. The Communist mouthpiece, Global Times, a nationalist outlet, said in an English report, Shijiazhuang residents appear “ready to overcome boredom and worry three days after the de-facto lockdown”, noting their “optimism, calm and sense of responsibility”.
State media reported that three officials in a district in Shijiazhuang have been “punished for dereliction of duty in coronavirus prevention and control after a resident tested positive on Jan 3”. It was only on Friday afternoon that the province’s first press conference was held by the communist authorities.
A year to the day on December 31, 2019, when the state media, Xinhua News Agency, first reported “27 pneumonia cases in Wuhan, capital of central China’s Hubei Province have been identified as viral pneumonia”, President Xi Jinping told China in a live broadcast on Dec 31, 2020, that China “has written an epic in fighting COVID-19 as the country put people and life first and fought the epidemic with unity and perseverance”. He did not mention Wuhan, once the epicentre of the deadly new coronavirus, nor the millions of innocents, including children, who have perished from the coronavirus and sickened across the world, or the thousands of lives lost in China.
Xi said China will “work tirelessly to create a better future for humanity,” Xinhua reported in the English translation of the speech. In a new year message, the Ethiopian physician head of the WHO, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, did not mention the deaths from the new coronavirus, nor did he mention Wuhan, merely offering that, “a new global threat emerged” and that “the pandemic has taken so many lives”.
The WHO has been condemned for its coverup of the deadly pandemic and for cosying up to China in the initial stages, saying there was “no evidence” of humans infecting humans, echoing the Chinese Communist Party line in December 2019.
Dr Ghebreyesus also pleaded for US$4 billion for vaccines, a year on from the emergence of the deadly pathogen. (KB)