An outbreak of new cases, stretching across the nation from the southeast to the north, has led to tightening of COVID-19 restrictions in cities throughout China. This latest spread of new cases is the worst since early 2020, and is attributed to the highly transmissible Omicron variant.
Shanghai has prolonged the lockdown measures after Sunday’s record number of new cases, reporting 25,173 new asymptomatic COVID-19 cases and 914 with symptoms. This Most people are still forced to stay in their apartments and get food delivered, a week after the shutdown was supposed to end. The city also made the move to online learning for elementary and middle schools on March 12.Shanghai has prolonged the lockdown measures after Sunday’s record number of new cases, reporting 25,173 new asymptomatic COVID-19 cases and 914 with symptoms. This Most people are still forced to stay in their apartments and get food delivered, a week after the shutdown was supposed to end. The city also made the move to online learning for elementary and middle schools on March 12.
Another city in the south of China, Guangzhou, also closed schools and shifted to online classes on Monday as they desperately tried to contain the spread of new cases. According to authorities, the measures will remain in place for at least a week. Locals are allowed to leave the city only when necessary and then only with a negative test result from within the last 48 hours. The 11 districts of Guangzhou city have started mass testing and plan to turn an expo center into an improvised hospital.
The Nio company has also suspended production of its electric vehicles and is delaying deliveries. A survey carried out by Morgan Stanley at the beginning of the month showed that nearly a third of the people in China were worried about being able to pay their rent or other bills.
In contrast, other major cities and provinces across the country have started to see a drop in the numbers of new cases. The province of Jilin, in the north, has reported a fall from more than up to 2,000 cases a day to a few hundred a day. On Sunday, Beijing registered no new cases and other cities in central China and near the coast reported fewer than 10 new cases with symptoms.
