The new rules for Pudong, half of Shanghai on the east side of the Huangpu River, were announced late Thursday night, just hours before the lockdown was supposed to end at 5 a.m. Friday. It is the latest sign that China’s largest city and largest economic power is struggling to eradicate an Omicron’s epidemic, which is the worst of the first in early 2020 to devastate Wuhan City and other parts of Hubei Province. The city announced on Friday morning that it had recorded 4,144 asymptomatic cases and 358 symptoms on Thursday, compared to 5,298 and 355 the previous day. It will fuel concerns about a slowdown in the Chinese economy that has already been badly affected by a series of lockdowns in key industrial centers. China’s manufacturing activity fell to a five-month low in March, according to a monthly survey on Thursday, as lockdowns and other restrictions forced factories to suspend production. Workers set up barricades to close the area before the second phase of a two-phase blockade to curb the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19) in Shanghai, China, on March 31, 2022. REUTERS / Aly Song Photo: Aly Song / Reuters The factories of the German car manufacturer BMW in Shenyang, a northeastern city of Liaoning province, have been closed for more than a week due to pandemic controls. The slowdown in China’s economy has also caused oil prices to plummet as markets bet that the world’s number two economy will not require so much fuel. Bill Bishop, a respected observer in China, said on Friday that concern about the outbreak in Shanghai had been heightened by reports in the Wall Street Journal that there had been deaths at a care unit in the city. “The outbreak in Shanghai is getting worse, it looks like the lockdowns will be tightened and extended,” Sinocism wrote in its weekly newsletter. “The data on the number of cases from Shanghai already seems a bit strange, if the officials also cover deaths, then that could be very bad.” Changes to the rules in Shanghai mean that anyone living in a building where a positive case has been found will have to stay home for another 10 days. Residents of other buildings in the same residential complex will be confined for another three days. People living in the vicinity of a positive case will face less restrictive boundaries. They may be allowed to shop for basic necessities, but only for a limited time on certain days. Panic shopping and massive trials in Shanghai as 25 million people put on lockdown for Covid – video A lockdown in the western half of the city was to begin as scheduled on Friday morning, as Shanghai struggles with China’s strict zero-Covid policy of trying to eradicate the virus altogether. About 16 million people will be examined during the lockdown at Puxi on the west side of the Shanghai River. Residents are not allowed to leave their neighborhoods or homes during the four days, handing over groceries or food to their complexes. Ma Chunlei, a senior Shanghai official, acknowledged the shortcomings in the city’s response. Authorities rushed to boost food supplies to the city after panic over the stripped shelves of emergency department stores. “We were not prepared enough,” Ma said. “We sincerely accept the criticism from the public and make efforts to improve it.” There was some good news elsewhere in China when authorities announced the lifting of the lockdown across the city in the hardest hit province. Jilin residents will be able to move freely from Friday for the first time in more than three weeks, state television network CCTV reported, citing an announcement from the city. They should wear masks and, when indoors, stay within 1 meter (3 feet). Public gatherings in parks and squares are prohibited. The spread of Covid-19 has been brought under control in Jilin but not in the rest of Jilin Province, officials told a news conference. Some progress has been made in Changchun, the provincial capital, and a car hub that has been closed since March 11. So far, most of the outbreaks in the ongoing outbreak have been in Jilin Province, which borders North Korea in the industrial northeast of China. China reported 8,559 new cases in the past 24 hours on Thursday, of which 6,720 had no symptoms. The rate of asymptomatic cases was higher than in previous cases, especially in Shanghai. About 100 of the new cases were imported among people who had recently arrived from abroad. With the Associated Press
