China’s Covid Fight Disrupts Businesses, Food Supplies as Cases Spread
By Wenxin Fan, Oct. 27, 2022, WSJ
HONG KONG—China showed no signs of easing its zero-Covid policies that are taking a heavy toll on its economy, as fresh cases disrupted businesses in major cities and food supplies in a remote northwestern region.
On Thursday, the central Chinese city of Zhengzhou, which is home to Foxconn Technology Group, the largest iPhone assembler, said the virus was spreading quickly there and identified 50 affected areas. The city reported 69 cases over the past three days.
Foxconn said a “small number” of its workforce had tested positive for Covid-19 but that its operations were “relatively stable.” It also said a rumor circulating that 20,000 workers had tested positive wasn’t true.
In Beijing, the Universal Resort theme park in Beijing shut down on Wednesday after the government published the contact tracing history of two positive cases that showed the people had been at the theme park. The park, which is part owned by Comcast
Corp., said it would work to disinfect, test staff members and resume operations as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, a lockdown in the city of Xining disrupted food supplies there. On Wednesday, officials in the city of 2.5 million laid out efforts to provide meat and vegetables for residents, while asking them to bear with efforts to stamp out the virus.
The official number of cases across China is small in comparison to waves of the virus that have hit elsewhere in the world. On Thursday, China reported more than 1,200 cases.
Yet, policies that include lockdowns, mass testing and government quarantines have magnified the impact. As of Monday, a little more than 200 million people were affected by some degree of lockdowns in 28 cities, according to investment bank Nomura.
China’s Communist Party has repeatedly vowed to stick to its Covid strategy and has given no clear indication of when it may shift away from it. At the Communist Party congress last week, leader Xi Jinping defended the policies, saying that they had “
protected the people’s health and safety to the greatest extent possible.”
There has been some easing of measures in recent months. In June, China shortened the length of compulsory quarantine for travelers from overseas and close contacts of positive cases, cutting it down to seven days from 14.
But there are also signs Beijing is preparing for a long fight against Covid. Health officials have urged local governments to build quarantine hospitals to prepare for rebounding infections.
Shanghai is planning to build a 3,000-bed quarantine facility on the outskirts of the city, according to a report by Chinese media outlet Caixin. There are similar projects planned in other Chinese cities.
Chinese medical officials have said a higher vaccination rate among its citizens could help the country to phase out the current policies.
This week the city of Shanghai started a small-scale program offering an inhalable Covid vaccine. Developed by CanSino Biologics Inc., the vaccine takes the form of a mist, and is provided as a free booster dose to those who have been previously
vaccinated.
In Xining, the troubles over food supplies started after the city shut down its primary wholesale food market on Oct. 20, after three positive cases were traced back to it. The whole city was put under lockdown the next day. The city conducted nine
million Covid tests and found several dozen asymptomatic cases. More grocery stores were closed, adding pressure to prices already rising from the transportation costs pushed up by Covid restrictions in supplying regions.
Xining’s officials said the measures were vital to stop a variant that is extremely contagious. “Stop moving, now…that’s the top priority,” said Han Xingbin, a deputy mayor. “The inconvenience and the lack of freedom will only be temporary.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-covid-fight-disrupts-businesses-food-supplies-as-cases-spread-11666879925
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