China Battles Multiple Outbreaks As Omicron Variant Surges

THE COVID OUTBREAKS across China are expanding. The National Health Commission on March 14 reported a daily total of 1,337 new locally transmitted cases, including 895 in the northeastern border province of Jilin.

Severe movement restrictions have been imposed on Jilin, the first provincial-wide sealing-off since much of Hubei was locked down in 2020 following the first outbreak in its provincial capital, Wuhan. This broadens the restrictions imposed last week on the provincial capital of Changchun, where most of Jilin’s infections have been reported. Emergency isolation hospitals are being erected. Toyota’s factory there has had to halt production. (Update: Jilin City mayor Wang Lu has been sacked due to ineffective epidemic prevention and control, Xinhua reports.)

In Shanghai, schools have reverted to online teaching, road transport to the city is being restricted. A ban on inbound international flights is reportedly being considered.

The lockdown in central Shenzhen has expanded to cover most of the city’s 17.5 million population, and three rounds of testing have been ordered. High-tech factories such as those of Apple supplier Hon Hai Precision Industry (Foxconn) and Huawei will temporarily stop production. However, the Shenzhen Yantian Port container terminal is still operating, but under strict Covid controls.

The Shenzhen outbreak is likely to be a spillover from the raging infection in neighbouring Hong Kong, where 26,908 new daily cases and 249 deaths were reported on Monday. New infections appear to have plateaued, but deaths are still rising, especially among the unvaccinated elderly.

New cases are also reported in Beijing, Tianjin and cities across Guangdong province.

As of March 9, 14 of China’s provinces had been declared high or medium-risk for the virus. The clusters of outbreaks caused by the fast-spreading Omicron sub-variant BA2 are proving a stiff test of Beijing’s zero-tolerance policy.

No death from the virus has been reported in China since January 2021. However, on Friday, National Health Commissioner Ma Xiaowei said strict controls need to be kept in place.

Hu Tells Kim (Yes, He Was There) To Open Up

Xinhua has confirmed the somewhat badly kept secret that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il was in China last week, if not that his youngest son and presumed heir, Kim Jong Un, was with him, even though seven North Korean officials on the trip were mentioned by name in the report. The visit, the second by the usually stay-at-home Kim senior to China this year, was described as unofficial.

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Kim (left) told President Hu Jintao when they met in Changchun on Friday that he was hoping for an early resumption of the stalled six-nation nuclear talks that Beijing has been trying to get going again. Not much detail on how or when that might happen.

Hu did, however, during an orgy of fraternal remarks on both sides, take the opportunity to stress to Kim on the basis of China’s experience the importance of economic development and that opening up to the world was an inevitable part of that. To what extent that fell on receptive ears, it is impossible to say, though from Kim’s reported remarks during the meeting, his world may extend no further beyond the Hermit Kingdom than Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces.