The technological metropolis of Shenzhen, in southeastern China, partially lifted this Friday the sanitary restrictions imposed by a covid outbreak, especially in its port, vital for the national economy.
The decision by the mayor's office of the city of 17.5 million inhabitants, at the gates of Hong Kong, comes after Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday called for “minimizing” the impact of anti-covid measures on the Chinese economy.
Shenzhen, home to thousands of factories of big technology giants, decreed a total lockdown on Sunday following the detection of cases of covid linked to the pandemic outbreak in Hong Kong, with tens of thousands of cases daily.
Public transport can resume service, as well as administration and economic activity in five districts of the city, the mayor's office said Thursday night.
The transmission of the coronavirus could be halted in these five areas, which represent almost half of the city's extensive territory, the council noted.
Among the districts concerned is that of Yantian, where one of the largest ports in the world is located, through which 10.5% of the containers used in Chinese foreign trade transit.
The rapid easing of restrictions in less than a week illustrates the authorities' concern about the economic impact of the “zero covid” strategy implemented for two years.
President Xi ordered Thursday to maintain this policy to “stop the spread of the epidemic as quickly as possible”, which is at the highest levels of contagion in China since the first wave started in late 2019.
But he also called for “minimizing the impact of the epidemic on economic and social development,” which has already led Beijing to set its weakest annual growth target in 30 years (5.5%).
Thanks to its drastic health strategy, China achieved an official balance of 125,000 infections and less than 5,000 deaths from covid-19. His last recorded death dates back to January 2021.
But the omicron variant puts the success of this strategy at risk. On Friday, authorities reported 4,365 infections nationwide, 105 of them in Shenzhen.
Sixty per cent of the new cases come from Jilin province (northeastern), on the border with North Korea.
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