China is facing a serious resumption of the Covid-19 epidemic and has just announced, on Friday March 11, the confinement of the 9 million inhabitants of the city of Changchun, in the north-east of the country. Since the beginning of the week, several hundred new cases have been recorded every day. This is the highest level of the epidemic for two years in the country.
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In addition to the confinement of Changchun, the authorities have reinforced health measures throughout the country, particularly in Beijing. A residence in the Chinese capital has just been confined, one of the inhabitants had traveled to an area where cases have been reported. It is under police surveillance, and residents must remain in their apartments until further notice.
At least nine residences in Beijing are in the same situation: no entry, no exit. Parcel deliverers, very numerous in the capital, are the first affected. “We cannot enter the residencesexplains a delivery man. We leave the packages at the entrance and above all must be disinfected in our company. And when residents receive packages, they have to disinfect them again.”
In the same district, the French Cultural Institute was disinfected, closed after a suspected case. The population has put into practice its old reflexes. “When screenings are organised, I go down immediately to take the test.explains a resident. There, I do exercises in this little garden, but afterwards, I immediately go home.”
“I wear the mask well and I don’t go to crowded places.”
A resident of Beijingat franceinfo
Neighborhood committee officials spend their day on the phone to trace the paths of people, potentially no contact. Extreme vigilance, because China above all does not want to find itself in the Hong Kong scenario, faced with an unprecedented explosion of the Covid-19 epidemic.