In China, the zero tolerance policy for Covid-19 remains in force, despite advances in the medical field. After a new increase in cases of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, cities in the country face a new lockdown, such as Guangzhou, Wuhan, Xining and Beijing.

On October 27, China registered, for the third consecutive day, more than a thousand new cases of Covid. According to the Our World In Data platform, on October 30th, more than 2 thousand infections were confirmed. In this scenario, considered a warning for local standards, the country once again closes public buildings and blocks districts.

Previously, the zero tolerance policy has already been criticized. However, the main justification is the low number of Covid-related deaths everywhere else. Officially, the most populous country in the world confirms less than 6,000 deaths from the virus.

“When there is a case somewhere and you become a close contact, you need to quarantine,” Wen Bihan told the Reuters news agency. Previously, Beijing resident Bihan was isolated twice as he was considered a close contact of confirmed cases of coronavirus infection.

On October 31, Shanghai Disney Resort suspended its operations, complying with preventive measures against Covid-19. Tourists and visitors will be tested for the infection.

Population revolt

Residents of the city of Guangzhou, in southern China, defied the lockdown imposed in the region due to a new outbreak of Covid-19.

Images circulating on social media show protesters tearing down barricades intended to confine them to their homes and taking to the streets.

The protest was said to have taken place on Monday 14 November in the industrial hub’s Haizhu district, which has been under an increasingly restrictive lockdown since 5 November as the epicenter of the disease outbreak.

It is unclear how many people were involved in the protest, or how long it lasted. Related posts were quickly deleted from the Chinese internet by government censors.

According to the American news network CNN, the Haizhu administration reported that the area was still “largely closed” on November 15th. Local authorities did not provide further details about the demonstrations in the region.

The street protest, an extremely rare event in China where authorities maintain tight control over critics, appears yet another sign of the public’s growing anger and desperation at the government’s strict Covid-Zero policy.

The scenes in Guangzhou, which reported more than 5,100 new Covid cases, the vast majority of them asymptomatic, come as Beijing’s relentless effort to contain the spread of the virus faces questions of sustainability, amid fast-spreading new variants.