Shanghai, Coronavirus | Corona fight opened between police and Shanghai residents

The city and its 25 million residents are at the epicenter of the largest outbreak of coronavirus since the first wave of infections in Wuhan more than two years ago. Residents who have been under an extremely strict lockdown have complained about food shortages and officials eager to force them into quarantine. The authorities are working hard to build a quarantine reception center with thousands of beds, while the number of new infected people has exceeded 20,000 per day.

On Thursday evening, videos appeared on social media, in which residents of an apartment complex chanted their protest against the police officers’ attempt to enter. Apparently, several people were arrested and the residents accused the police of beating.

forced transfer

The incident erupted when 39 families were ordered to move “to meet the need for epidemic prevention and control”. Their apartments will be used to house people who have tested positive, according to the real estate company that owns the area. The company says residents who have had to move have been offered other apartments.

– They are trying to turn our residential area into a quarantine center and let the infected live here, a woman shouts in protest.

Videos containing criticism and demonstrations are often quickly removed from social media in China. This time, too, digital tracks were wiped away, and searches for the relevant apartment complex yielded no results on Weibo, a Chinese service often compared to Twitter.

Divorced children and parents

In addition to food shortages and strict quarantine rules, there have been protests against the fact that a health worker killed someone’s dog and separated children infected with coronavirus from their healthy parents, a scheme that has since been watered down.

Authorities say the city “absolutely doesn’t want to relax,” but continues to set up quarantine places for anyone who tests positive — whether they show symptoms or not.