Shanghai city authorities say a taxing, one-month lockdown of China’s largest city may be eased in some neighborhoods if new COVID-19 testing shows the virus is no longer spreading in the community.
Residents in Beijing, meanwhile, were carefully watching for word on whether the capital city would lockdown as its own, much smaller outbreak grew. Shanghai’s outbreak is China’s largest of the pandemic and has tested China’s zero-tolerance strategy of trying to stop the spread of the virus entirely.
Nervous Beijing residents have been stockpiling food and supplies in recent days, following Shanghai’s troubles under lockdown. Beijing city officials were quick to promise that they were ensuring grocery stores would be well-stocked.
But social media reports have shown empty store shelves in Beijing amid fears of a lockdown.
Beijing has reported 92 cases of coronavirus infection in five days, a relatively tiny figure in a city with 21 million residents. But China is trying to eliminate outbreaks entirely in contrast to how much of the world is trying to live with the virus.
That zero-tolerance policy has virtually shut down China's largest city, Shanghai, for three weeks.