(Beijing) China on Monday reported the deaths of two new COVID-19 patients, elderly people in Beijing, as several major cities continue to impose strict health restrictions despite recent promises of easing.
The Asian country is the last major world economy to apply a strict health policy, called zero COVID-19, which aims to do everything to prevent contamination and death.
It consists of imposing confinements as soon as cases appear, quarantines for people who test positive and almost daily PCR tests.
On November 11, the government unveiled several significant relaxations. But local authorities continue to apply strict measures in the face of the spread of the virus.
The Ministry of Health announced on Monday around 27,000 new local positive cases (the vast majority asymptomatic) over the past 24 hours. A high figure for China, used to having only tens or hundreds of new cases.
The new deceased are a 91-year-old woman and an 88-year-old man, both with serious medical histories including strokes, authorities said.
China announced on Sunday its first death from COVID-19 since May, an 87-year-old Beijinger.
Beijing reported 962 new cases in the city on Monday, against 621 the day before, out of 22 million inhabitants.
Nearly 600 areas of the capital, including residential buildings, are considered “high risk”, forcing their inhabitants to remain confined to their homes or to be transported to quarantine centers.
Schools have switched to online courses and employees are being asked to work from home.
Restrictions remain in several other major cities, including Canton (south), where tens of thousands of cases have been identified in a week.
The zero-COVID-19 strategy, effective in curbing the spread of the virus, however, deals a severe blow to the economy, isolates China from the rest of the world and causes great weariness among the Chinese.
The 20 new rules published on November 11 to “optimize” this policy include a simplification of travel and a reduction in quarantine times, in particular for travelers arriving from abroad.
Several cities had in the process abandoned the PCR tests imposed several times a week on the inhabitants, raising the hope of a reopening of the country.
But the death announced on Sunday sent Asian stock markets plummeting, worried about potential new restrictions. Hong Kong ended Monday down almost 2%.