Doomsayers in China: The Last Day of Covid-19: Why Is My Daughter Evelyn Not Chinese? How Do We Expect to Live Here in China?

Matthew Bossons is an editor and journalist who lives in Shanghai. He has been living in China for a few years. The views of the author are of his own. View more opinion on CNN.

While I fully agree that China’s hard-line approach to Covid-19 containment has saved lives, the policy’s impacts are beginning to seem worse than the disease.

Wu blasted the advice out to his nearly half a million followers on Weibo, China’s heavily censored version of Twitter, and it was quickly picked up and further publicized by state-backed media outlets.

This latest episode tells me that the lessons about xenophobia that the Covid-19 pandemic offered have not been learned here and that leaving Shanghai is the right decision for my family and me.

Infamously, many of the city’s African residents were expelled from their residences and denied access to hotels despite having not left the country since the pandemic began. Out of fear of contracting the virus, taxi drivers refused to pick up foreigners, gyms turned away non-Chinese patrons and expats on the subway found themselves with more personal space than usual as local commuters fled for the neighboring carriage.

These memories came flooding back in the wake of Wu’s social media post. And while I pondered how local commuters may receive me on the bus to work the following Monday, a bigger concern loomed: How would my five-year-old daughter be treated by her peers at the local kindergarten she attends in our new home base of Shanghai. In July 2020 we moved from Guangzhou to Beijing and from Beijing to Shanghai a year later.

Despite having Chinese ancestry, my daughter, Evelyn, does not look particularly Chinese, a fact that is often pointed out to my wife, who hails from Jiangsu province in eastern China. As such, she stands out among her classmates, who are all ethnically Chinese.

Evelyn told her mom on Monday that she wanted more than anything to look Chinese, which seemed to confirm my worst fears. She said that her classmates called her a foreigner in Mandarin Chinese, and she was very upset.

Ms. Sun has taken over as the enforcer of the country’s strict Pandemic restrictions. She is cast as a doomsayer when she comes to a city in the midst of an outbreak on the internet.

Words from power carry weight, and careless comments or malicious statements risk othering segments of society and fueling xenophobic attitudes. We saw this clearly with former US President Donald Trump’s repeated use of terms like “Chinese virus” and “kung flu,” which provided cover for the racists on Twitter and likely contributed to the rise in anti-Asian incidents in the US and other Western nations.

And while experts say it’s possible economic and other considerations could see China loosen certain controls in the coming year, an eventual end to zero-Covid may not see an end to all of its vestiges – especially as Xi, including in his Sunday address, has made clear his focus on increasing “security” in China.

A video of her cries at the hazmat-suited workers below on a Weibo platform has gone up on social media and shows how the Chinese public are angry with the government over its zero- covidy policy.

Since returning from university this summer, the woman has been under the care of a health care provider and has been under house arrest. They stare back, seemingly not paying much attention.

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In state-run media this week, authorities in China insisted that the battle against the virus was still very much alive, despite the fact that many Asian economies are no longer imposing restrictions.

Observers across the world will be watching the twice-a-decade meeting for signs of the party’s priorities when it comes to its zero-Covid stance, which has been blamed for exacerbating mounting problems in the economy, from stalled growth to a collapsing housing market.

The scale of public frustration is difficult to gauge, as it appears to be rising over lockdowns, digital health codes, and the constant threat of being sent to centralized sterilization. The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank recently lowered their GDP growth forecasts for China, citing zero-Cid as one of the major drags.

In Wuhan, there was chaos. The city shut itself off from the outside world, as hospitals were overrun with the sick and dying. Huge swaths of China, too, locked down, grinding the country to a halt. The public outrage over the delays in the official release of information lit up social media quicker than the censors could suppress it.

Numerous accounts on Weibo and WeChat, the super-app essential for daily life in China, have been banned after commenting on – or alluding to – the protest.

Still, many spoke out to express their support and awe. Some shared the Chinese pop hit “Lonely Warrior” in a veiled reference to the protester, who some called a “hero,” while others swore never to forget, posting under the hashtag: “I saw it.”

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But, now, as Xi steps into an expected new era of his rule, that system – known today as the “dynamic zero-Covid” policy – is facing both social and economic pushback.

More than 300 million people across dozens of cities in China had been affected by full or partial lockdowns at one point last month, according to CNN’s calculations.

The city reported 47 Covid-19 cases on Thursday, one day after authorities ordered six out of its 13 districts to shut entertainment venues such as internet cafes, cinemas and bars. Disney has suspended live performances at some of its attractions.

Spooked by the possibility of unpredictable and unannounced snap lockdowns – and mindful that authorities have previously backtracked after suggesting that no such measures were coming – some people in the city have reportedly been hoarding drinking water.

The panic buying was made worse by the announcement that the water authority in Shanghai had taken action to make sure the quality of the water.

The country has also seen an uptick in cases in domestic tourist destinations, despite its strict curbs having discouraged people from traveling or spending over China’s Golden Week holiday in early October.

More than 240,000 university students have been locked down on campus due to the latest outbreak according to a deputy director of the regional Department of Education. The university Communist Party boss was sacked after 39 of his students tested positive for HIV, as a result of the outbreak on campus.

In far western Xinjiang, a total of 22 million people have been banned from leaving and are required to stay. According to an official tally, there were more than 400 new cases on Thursday.

Beijing doesn’t seem to want to move from its hardline stance. For three days this week, the state-run Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily published commentaries reiterating that China would not let its guard down.

The battle against Covid was winnable, it insisted. It said other countries that had reopened and reduced restrictions had done so because they had failed to effectively control the epidemic.

HONG KONG — As anger simmered in Wuhan over the mishandling of the first coronavirus outbreak in early 2020, the Communist Party sent top officials to deal with the growing political crisis. One of them, Sun Chunlan, stayed for three months, rallying local cadres and sourcing protective gear for health workers and hospital beds for patients.

Calling for absolute loyalty in a war against the virus, Ms. Sun warned that any deserters would be “nailed to the pillar of historical shame forever.”

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It is a role that she has become accustomed to, as a woman in the upper levels of Chinese politics she drives the Communist Party’s will and bears its criticism. “Women most of the time get pushed to the frontline when male politicians don’t want to deal with a crisis,” said Hanzhang Liu, assistant professor of politics at Pitzer College.

Nearly three years later, however, Xi is poised to cement his place as China’s most powerful leader in decades, when he is anointed with a likely norm-breaking third term as the party chief on Sunday.

As China’s Communist Party National Congress meets this week to approve the party’s priorities for the next five years, many are watching for signs restrictions could be loosened. But with Xi having personally tied himself to the policy, any change would need to come straight from the top – and from a leader, who throughout his rule, has sought to extend, not curtail, the party’s control on daily life.

China’s advanced online ecosystem – run on mobile phone superapps and ubiquitous QR codes – has offered arguably unrivaled convenience for consumers to shop, dine and travel. Now, those technologies play a role in constraining daily life.

Mobile phone health codes are the backbone of a system designed to track citizens and designate whether they are cleared to enter various venues, upping state control on people’s movement to an extent never before seen in China.

Basic activities like going to the grocery store or riding public transportation with an up-to-date negative Covid test need to be held in order to be seen as not being close to a patient, which is reflected by a color code.

Going out in public can be dangerous, as being placed under a state of siege or barricaded by authorities into a mall or office building is possible if someone tests positive for a disease.

Li, a resident of the city, said that there are flaws in big data when it has control over your daily life.

Li, who’d been with his wife at the time but received no such message, said they were eventually able to reach a hotline and explain their situation, ultimately returning her health code to green.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/20/china/china-party-congress-xi-jinping-zero-covid-intl-hnk/index.html

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One of three similar editorials that were released last week is from the People’s Daily, which says the essence of persisting with dynamic zero- Covid is putting people first and priority life.

“What makes you think that you won’t be on that late-night bus one day?” read a viral comment, which garnered more than 250,000 likes before it was censored – one of a number of glimpses into rising frustration with the cost of the policy.

Last week, a rare political protest in Beijing saw banners hung from a bridge along the capital’s busy Third Ring Road that zoned in on social controls under the policy.

Speaking before some 2,300 mostly surgical-mask clad Communist Party members at the opening of the party’s five-yearly leadership reshuffle on Sunday, Xi gave a sweeping endorsement of China’s Covid controls, saying the party had “protected the people’s health and safety to the greatest extent possible” and “made tremendous, encouraging achievements in both epidemic and social development.”

As the effects of those controls become more pronounced, they are leaving people struggling for access to food and medicine as well as grappling with lost income and a mental toll.

In the run up to the Party Congress, local authorities around the country have taken steps to get rid of any infectious diseases that could be linked to the event.

“At the same time, the threat posed by Covid is reduced because of the higher vaccine coverage and the availability of antivirals. The point has already been crossed where continuing zero- Covid would be considered a cost-effective strategy for a transition away from it.

Outside experts say that, since the virus will stay in circulation beyond China, keeping tight controls and closed borders is just delaying the inevitable, and the focus should be on preparing, for example through raising elderly vaccination rates and increasing ICU capacity, as well as getting or expanding access to the most effective vaccines and treatments.

While China backed a massive vaccination campaign since early 2021, it has relied on homegrown shots, which produce lower levels of protective antibodies than mRNA vaccines developed in the West.

The vaccines and expansion of the intensive care unit take time and if there is no preparation for the change, that makes it clear that they are not planning to change their policy any time soon.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/20/china/china-party-congress-xi-jinping-zero-covid-intl-hnk/index.html

Do we want the Chinese government to stop the Great Leap forward, or can China’s Communist Party fall into an anglo Saxon?

Already the health code system has been used to diffuse social protest – with petitioners who lost their savings in rural banks barred from protesting after their health codes inexplicably turned red.

In the lead-up to China’s Communist Party Congress last month, watercooler chatter in many offices here focused on a single question: Will the Congress abandon its zero-Covid policy?

The Great Leap forward was the industrial reform campaign that precipitated a devastating famine in the 50s and was followed by political witch hunts of the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution which almost tore China apart. One of the Communist Party’s greatest achievements is the perfect interplay between the government and the population.

Past campaigns of mass control have come and gone, but this one will have lasting consequences thanks to its most insidious aspect: the surveillance technology rolled out nationwide to suppress Covid but which allows citizens to be tracked by authorities, their movements circumscribed. Government officials used this system to restrict the movements of people who wanted to take part in a protest in central China in June. Those officials were later punished, but the fact remains that the government now has a system that Mao Zedong could only have dreamed of, powered by data and algorithms, to monitor and control the people.

A hardware tech executive in Shenzhen said that his country is falling into an “anglo Saxon” under the leadership of the dictator. “But you can’t do anything about it. It hurts and causes me to be depressed.

Many businesspeople have lost a lot of money under “zero-Covid,” which has shuttered cities and locked millions of people in their homes for weeks at a time as the government seeks to eliminate the coronavirus.

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We didn’t discuss politics over the years. I was surprised when he called after the party congress to talk about his “political depression.” He said he used to be very nationalistic, believing that the Chinese were among the smartest and the most hardworking people in the world. He and his friends spend most of their time hiking, golfing and drinking. He said that they were too depressed to work.

His start-up was doing well and he was planning to take it public, but that changed a year ago. Then he lost a big chunk of his revenues and his new hires sat idly with nothing to do when cities were locked down under the “zero-Covid” rules. With no choice but to lay off more than 100 people and move his family to North America he said, he had no choice.

The tech mogul from Beijing told me that he was terrified at the party congress. He wasn’t able to tell people to leave work early and stock up on groceries because of rumors that Beijing could be locked down. He was concerned that he could be reported for spreading rumors that resulted in people being arrested. He told them that they should be free to leave if they needed to.

Students in many cities in China are back to remote learning. My daughter, who is 5 years old, is not in school for a second week because of restrictions related to Covid-19. She spent more time at her home in the year 2022, than in the classroom.

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It is difficult to plan more than 20 minutes in advance because of restrictions at a moment’s notice. This is bad for business, of course, but it also affects ordinary people’s ability to go about their lives — you never know when you might get locked down in your apartment, workplace, a local mall or even Shanghai Disneyland.

The friends have taken to carrying a backpack full of clothes, shoes, and other essentials with them in case they get trapped at the pub, when they have suffered through an unexpected ring or two.

One in five urban youth in the country are jobless, business meetings and trade shows are being postponed or canceled, and workplaces are regularly shuttered over concerns about the coronavirus, including the recent lockdown at a Foxconn manufacturing center — which left employees literally fleeing down a highway.

You would presume that traveling from a city with a well-publicized disease outbreak would be enough to warrant immediate notice of self-isolation upon debarking the plane. Alas, not.

But here’s the real kicker: While I needed to stay home for four days, my wife and daughter, who live with me, were allowed to leave the apartment and wander around the city at will. Now, let’s assume I was infected with the virus and that my family were now carriers: Why would a policy intended to protect people’s health “to the greatest extent possible,” to quote Xi, allow for such a flagrant risk to public wellness?

On the heels of the Inner Mongolia suicide, Chinese social media users lamented the role lockdowns have played in fueling mental health issues and criticized government officials for not paying attention to the needs of those trapped in their apartments.

A woman suffering from anxiety disorders jumped to her death from her locked-down apartment building in the capital city of China.

A boy died following a suspected gas leak at a locked-down residential compound in the western city of Lanzhou. On social media, the boy’s father said that he tried to alert health workers of his Covid-19 status but was denied prompt access to emergency services.

While there is no shortage of vocal zero-Covid defenders on Chinese social media, there are also some voicing disapproval online and offline in the country.

Following the young boy’s death in Lanzhou, the internet rage machine was running at full capacity, with related hashtags on Weibo racking up hundreds of millions of views.

Anger was primarily directed at the government’s censorship of posts related to the incident and “excessive Covid-19 prevention measures.” Unverified videos show city residents shouting at public health workers and riot police, as well as other people, on the streets of the city.

Unfortunately for those hoping for a swift end to zero-Covid, negative public feedback is unlikely to result in any immediate changes. But if the economic situation does not improve and discontent grows, it could force the government to reevaluate its position — it has happened before.