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A year ago, a notice sent to smartphones in Wuhan at 2 a.m. announced the world’s first coronavirus lockdown, bringing China’s bustling industrial and transportation hub to a virtual standstill almost overnight. It would last 76 days.
Early Saturday morning, however, residents of the town where the virus was first detected were jogging and practicing tai chi in a fog-covered park by the mighty Yangtze River.
Life has largely returned to normal in the city of 11 million people, even as the rest of the world grapples with the spread of the most contagious variants of the virus. Efforts to vaccinate people against COVID-19 have been thwarted by disarray and limited supplies in some places. The scourge has killed more than 2 million people around the world.
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Traffic was light in Wuhan, but there was no sign of the barriers that a year ago isolated neighborhoods, prevented movement around the city, and confined people to their apartment complexes and even their apartments. .
Wuhan accounted for the bulk of the 4,635 COVID-19 deaths in China, a number that has remained largely static for months. The city has been largely free from further outbreaks since the lockdown was lifted on April 8, but questions persist as to the origin of the virus and whether Wuhan and Chinese authorities acted quickly enough and with sufficient transparency to enable the world to prepare for a pandemic that has sickened more than 98 million people.
Wuhan has been praised for her sacrifice in the service of the nation, turning her into a sort of Stalingrad in China’s war on the virus, commemorated in books, documentaries, TV shows, and flourishing eulogies of officials, including the head of state and the leader of the communist. Xi Jinping Party.
“We think Wuhan is a heroic city. After all, it shut down its economy to help China cope with the pandemic. It is a noble act,” said Chen Jiali, a 24-year-old resident, who works in an Internet sales company.
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China announced 107 more cases on Saturday, bringing its total since the start of the pandemic to 88,911. Of these, northern province of Heilongjiang accounted for the highest number with 56. Beijing and eastern financial center of Shanghai all have two reported three new cases amid mass testing and hospital and housing closures linked to recent outbreaks.
Authorities are wary of the potential of a new wave around next month’s Lunar New Year holiday and tell people not to travel and to avoid gatherings as much as possible. Schools are rented a week earlier and many have already switched to online courses. Wearing a mask remains practically universal indoors and on public transport. Mobile phone apps are used to track people’s movements and prove that they are both virus free and have not been in areas where suspected cases have been found.
Since the lockdown ended, Wuhan has largely been spared from further outbreaks, which residents such as chemistry professor Yao Dongyu attribute to heightened awareness resulting from last year’s traumatic experience.
“At that time people were very nervous, but the government gave us enormous support. It was a very powerful guarantee, so we went through it together, ”said Yao, 24. “Since the people of Wuhan went through the pandemic, they have done better in terms of personal precautions than people in other regions.
China has steadfastly defended its actions in the early days of the outbreak, saying it helped buy time for the rest of the world while pushing marginal theories that the virus had been brought into the city from outside. from China, possibly from a lab in the United States.
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After months of negotiations, China finally authorized the World Health Organization last week to send a team of international experts to begin investigating the origins of the virus. They are currently undergoing two weeks of quarantine.
A WHO-commissioned panel of experts this week criticized China and other countries for failing to act to stem the initial outbreak earlier, prompting Beijing to admit it could have done better.
Meanwhile, in Hong Kong, southern China, thousands of residents were locked up to an unprecedented extent on Saturday to contain a worsening epidemic in the city.
Hong Kong has been working to contain a new wave of coronavirus since November. More than 4,300 cases have been recorded in the past two months, representing nearly 40% of the city’s total.
Authorities said in a statement that an area comprising 16 buildings in the working-class Yau Tsim Mong neighborhood will be locked down until all residents have been tested.
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