Food sometimes difficult to access, patients refused hospital treatment, fear of being placed in solitary confinement: Shanghainese people expressed their weariness on Friday with the progressive confinement of China’s most populous city.
Shanghai and its 25 million people are facing their worst outbreak since the start of the pandemic, which caught the national zero Covid strategy by surprise.
To avoid total confinement facing Omicron, the town hall alternately put the two halves of the city under a bell to carry out a general screening there.
The east of the metropolis (Pudong) had been completely confined since Monday for four days. From this Friday, it is the turn of the west (Puxi) for in theory the same duration.
However, many residential complexes in Pudong, where the emblematic skyscrapers of the business district are located, remain confined due to the discovery of positive cases.
“It is in fact a general confinement of the city”, judges a user of the social network Weibo.
The announcement of the confinements on Sunday had caused an influx into supermarkets of consumers eager to stock up on food. Since then, vegetable prices have jumped — tripling in some markets.
Another concern: even home fresh produce delivery applications, ultra-popular in China, are struggling due to a shortage of delivery people to keep up with demand, which has exploded.
“Usually, it’s super simple. Everything is available and you are delivered in half an hour or an hour, ”explains to AFP Ms. Tang, 42, director of a consulting firm.
“But now some of the products are no longer available. And delivery takes much, much longer. »
” Badly managed “
It is now necessary to place an order as soon as the online store opens in the morning to hope to be delivered during the day.
However, no shortage is to be feared, according to the official media, which showed market gardeners working “24 hours a day” in the suburbs of Shanghai to meet demand.
The authorities have announced that they are distributing baskets of fresh produce.
“The medical staff are working really hard” but overall “I think it’s poorly managed,” Sun Jian, a Shanghainese who has been confined since Friday, told AFP.
“For example, forcing people to line up together for their Covid test, it helps to spread the virus,” said the 29-year-old resident.
“But what everyone is most afraid of is being sent to quarantine in these prefabs that serve as isolation rooms. The conditions are very bad. »
This is where the wife and son of Mr. Dong, 32, who tested positive this week, are currently.
“Their room is new, but they don’t have gas yet. So there is no hot water, just cold water and they cannot take a shower,” he told AFP.
The press also reports cases of patients with asthma or requiring dialysis who died after being turned away from hospitals for lack of negative Covid tests.
Shanghai pride
A senior city official, Ma Chunlei, conceded this week that preparations for Covid had been “insufficient”.
On the Chinese social network Weibo, a hashtag has been created to allow Shanghainese to report their problems. The town hall has launched a helpline.
The Ministry of Health announced Friday more than 7,200 new positive cases nationwide — including about 4,500 in Shanghai.
High figures for China, which applies a zero Covid strategy.
This aims to do everything to prevent the appearance of new cases: confinements, border filtering, quarantine on arrival in the territory or even tracing of movements via mobile applications.
Health ministry spokesman Mi Feng said on Friday that the will to pursue the policy was “unwavering”.
Many Shanghai residents, however, remain surprised by the dysfunctions in the metropolis, which they imagined impossible in this sophisticated city, the richest in China.
“I think the pride of many Shanghainese in their city will drop a little,” said Sun Jian.