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SHANGHAI , May 01 (AP) \u2014 Traffic, pedestrians and joggers reappeared on the streets of Shanghai on Wednesday as China\u2019s largest city began returning to normalcy amid the easing of a strict two-month COVID-19 lockdown that has drawn unusual protests over its heavy-handed implementation.<\/p>\n
Shanghai\u2019s Communist Party committee, the city\u2019s most powerful political body, issued a letter online proclaiming the lockdown\u2019s success and thanking citizens for their \u201csupport and contributions.\u201d The move came amid a steady rollback in compulsory measures that have upended daily life for millions while severely disrupting the economy and global supply chains.<\/p>\n
While defending President and Communist Party chief Xi Jinping\u2019s hardline \u201czero-COVID\u201d policy, the country\u2019s leadership appears to be acknowledging the public backlash against measures seen as trampling already severely limited rights to privacy and participation in the workings of government.<\/p>\n
In one such step, the Cabinet\u2019s Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism issued a letter Tuesday laying out rules banning \u201cnon-standard, simple and rude indoor disinfection\u201d by mostly untrained teams in Shanghai and elsewhere that have left homes damaged and led to reports of property theft.<\/p>\n
Full bus and subway service in Shanghai was being restored from Wednesday, with rail connections to the rest of China to follow. Still, more than half a million people in the city of 25 million remain under lockdown or in designated control zones because virus cases are still being detected.<\/p>\n
The government says all restrictions will be gradually lifted, but local neighborhood committees still wield considerable power to implement sometimes conflicting and arbitrary policies. Negative PCR tests for COVID-19 taken within the previous 48 hours also remain standard in Shanghai, Beijing and elsewhere for permission to enter public venues.<\/p>\n
That measure didn\u2019t deter people in Shanghai from gathering outside to eat and drink under the watch of police deployed to discourage large crowds from forming.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith the lockdown lifting, I feel very happy. I feel today how I feel during Chinese New Year \u2014 that kind of mood and joy,\u201d said Wang Xiaowei, 34, who moved to Shanghai from the inland province of Guizhou just a week before the lockdown began.<\/p>\n
Liu Ruilin, 18, said she wasn\u2019t sure her building\u2019s security guard would let her and others out on Tuesday night. The restriction ended exactly at midnight, she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen we said, \u2018Let\u2019s go to the Bund to have fun,\u2019\u201d she said in the city\u2019s historic riverside district. \u201cWe thought there wouldn\u2019t be too many people here, but we were surprised after coming over that a lot of people are here. I feel pretty good \u2014 quite excited.\u201d<\/p>\n
Schools will partially reopen on a voluntary basis, and shopping malls, supermarkets, convenience stores and drug stores will gradually reopen at no more than 75% of their total capacity. Cinemas and gyms will remain closed.<\/p>\n
Health authorities on Wednesday reported just 15 new COVID-19 cases in Shanghai, down from a record high of around 20,000 daily cases in April.<\/p>\n
A few malls and markets have reopened, and some residents have been given passes allowing them out for a few hours at a time.<\/p>\n
The lockdown has prompted an exodus of Chinese and foreign residents, with crowds forming outside the city\u2019s Hongqiao Railway Station, where only some train services have resumed.<\/p>\n
Even while the rest of the world has opened up, China has stuck to a \u201czero-COVID\u201d strategy that requires lockdowns, mass testing and isolation at centralized facilities for anyone who is infected or has been in contact with someone who has tested positive.<\/p>\n
The country\u2019s borders also remain largely closed and the government has upped requirements for the issuance of passports and permission to travel abroad.<\/p>\n
At least half of foreign companies in Shanghai are waiting until next week to reopen while they put in place hygiene measures, said Bettina Schoen-Behanzin, a vice president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China. As a precaution, many companies plan to have only half their workforce on site at a time.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is still quite some uncertainty and a scare that if there is a positive case in the office building or in your compound, you might be locked down again,\u201d said Schoen-Behanzin, who works in Shanghai.<\/p>\n
The strict restrictions in Shanghai, the country\u2019s commercial capital and home of the world\u2019s busiest port, dragged down Chinese economic activity and disrupted global manufacturing and trade.<\/p>\n
Retail sales fell by a worse-than-forecast 11% in April from a year earlier, government data show. Auto sales fell by almost half from a year earlier, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.<\/p>\n
Private sector forecasters have cut their estimates for this year\u2019s economic growth to as low as 2%, well below the ruling Communist Party\u2019s target of 5.5%. Some expect output to shrink in the three months ending in June.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe economy is really in a crisis,\u201d said Schoen-Behanzin.<\/p>\n
The Port of Shanghai, the world\u2019s busiest, appears to be back to 80% to 85% of its normal operating capacity, according to Schoen-Behanzin. She cited data that said the port had a backlog of 260,000 cargo containers in April.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe rest of the world will feel these delays probably (through) June or July,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The city will likely see a \u201cmass exodus\u201d of foreign residents this summer, \u201cespecially families with small kids,\u201d Schoen-Behanzin said. She said about half of Shanghai\u2019s foreign residents had already left over the past two years.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople are really fed up with these lockdowns,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s not safe, especially if you have small children.\u201d<\/p>\n
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SHANGHAI , May 01 (AP) \u2014 Traffic, pedestrians and joggers reappeared on the streets of Shanghai on Wednesday as China\u2019s largest city began returning to normalcy amid the easing of a strict two-month COVID-19 lockdown that has drawn unusual protests over its heavy-handed implementation. Shanghai\u2019s Communist Party committee, the city\u2019s most powerful political body, issued […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-192101","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192101\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}