If it was decided to confine Shanghai, rather than to pursue its “targeted epidemic prevention policy”, it is because the central government has raised its voice. On March 22, the inspection and supervision team dispatched to Shanghai by the government met with Li Qiang, the city’s party secretary. According to the minutes of this meeting, the experts sent by Beijing argued for the need to apply the “zero Covid” policy, with Li saying that the city authorities would “stop leaks and eliminate all risk factors”.
On April 2, Deputy Prime Minister Sun Chunlan left Jilin [province du Nord-Est également frappée par une vague épidémique et un confinement] for Shanghai, where she in turn stressed the need to fully apply the “zero Covid” policy and “the obligation, as soon as necessary, to be tested, hospitalized, confined or treated”. The next day, she added that it was necessary “Do everything to win this difficult war against Covid-19” et “break the chains of transmission of the epidemic as quickly as possible”.
While the central government thus reaffirmed its determination, dissenting voices sounded the alarm within the administration itself. On April 2, a recording given as that of a “conversation between a Shanghai resident and the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CCDC)” circulated a lot on social networks. In it, a CCDC expert can be heard declaring that she had repeatedly advocated home isolation of patients who were asymptomatic or presenting only mild symptoms, then lamented that “Nobody listens to the advice of specialists. The Covid has become a political disease. We have committed disproportionate human and material resources for a virus no more serious than the flu. [Toute personne testée positive est en fait emmenée dans un centre d’isolement.] She added:
“The collateral damage is now much more serious than the epidemic itself.”
This conversation has been posted online with the permission of the expert.
Le 1is April, the site of the weekly Caixin revealed that residents of a residence in Pudong district had sent a collective letter to authorities asking that residents who tested positive but without serious symptoms be allowed to remain confined at home. While this letter caused heated discussions on the networks, the same evening, the residents who tested positive were informed by the CCDC that they would all be evacuated to places of confinement. “We may have all co-signed this letter, releasing others from all responsibility, but it was useless. It’s politics that matters.” This report from Caixin has since been censored.
As of April 6, authorities in Shanghai were reporting more than 90,000 cumulative positive cases, most of them asymptomatic. No serious cases had been reported [les derniers chiffres indiquent qu’entre le 28 mars et le 21 avril on dénombrait 430 000 cas majoritairement asymptomatiques et, au 24 avril, un total officiel de 138 morts]. At the same time, the confinement of the city has caused many tragedies, including the death of people suffering from asthma or requiring hemodialysis who could not be rescued in time. In the population, a little music is starting to rise: in a completely new way, those who are opposed to confinement, in favor of a relaxation of measures or wishing to be confined to their homes in the event of mild symptoms are making their voices heard. .
Why not “live with”?
Yuan Dashi, a middle school teacher in the Putuo district, says most people he meets would prefer to opt for the “live with it” policy. Only a minority would still defend “zero Covid”, citing the death toll in the United States and Hong Kong [au taux de décès dû au Covid le plus fort du monde, avec 9 249 morts] to demonstrate that living with the virus would be too high a price for China to pay. But for Yuan, “We pay the price for the ‘zero Covid’ policy every day: the economy suffers as do patients with other illnesses or children who can no longer leave their homes, whose psychological health is weakened. These effects are not assessed.” Yuan Dashi has lived in Shanghai for more than forty years and, according to him, it is a city that has always been at the forefront of reforms in China. But he believes that, this time, the turn taken by the anti-Covid measures reflects more a spirit of closure, which is gradually stifling the vitality of Shanghai.
That said, Yuan’s opinion reflects only part of that of the education sector. Li Huanlong, deputy director of the Fuyang District CCDC in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, said Shanghai is among a tiny minority of cities that have so far managed to combine prevention, economic development and minimizing the effects. negatives of the epidemic. As “targeted prevention measures” have lost their effectiveness, he supports Shanghai’s efforts to “give everything to push back this wave” before returning to targeted measures. This point of view, close to that affirming that Shanghai owes its problems to too late confinement, also has its supporters.
An expert in the hot seat
The shards of this struggle between the concepts of “living with” and “zero Covid” reflected very concretely on Zhang Wenhong, director of the infectious diseases department at Huashan Hospital and head of the group of experts responsible for the medical treatment of the disease. Covid-19 in Shanghai. Known for his outspokenness and open-mindedness, he said in June 2021 that “the Covid-19 virus would certainly remain on the planet for a long time” and that’“it therefore seemed necessary for humanity to learn to live with it”, attracting praise from part of the public but also very strong criticism.
After the March 25 press conference on the epidemic in Shanghai, Zhang did not appear in public for a whole week, so many believed him to be deposed. [il est réapparu dans les médias à la fin d’avril pour faire part de difficultés dans les soins apportés aux cas graves]. Then, once Shanghai was locked down, many netizens attacked him, posting scathing comments on his Weibo account, contemptuously calling him a “medical celebrity of the Net”. One of these messages said:
“If, from Shanghai, the virus spreads throughout China, you will have to atone [tes propos] by your death.”
In an April 3 post, Ren Yi, a writer and political commentator, wrote: “The fight against the epidemic has always been an eminently political issue. The ‘zero Covid’ is an insurmountable political position.” This article was subsequently deleted from the Internet, and political and scientific controversies over the fight against the epidemic no longer have room to develop.