China has censored a public post on its do-everything app WeChat, a day after the post went viral for questioning Beijing’s unrelenting COVID-19 policy. The post titled “10 Questions” indicated growing frustration among the Chinese public regarding government policies.
Posted on the app on Tuesday, the open letter received over 1,00,000 views. Moreover, many of the Author’s views seemed to be shared by other users and appeared to be inspired by feelings of isolation in contrast to the jubilant scenes at the FIFA World Cup being held in Qatar, reported Newsweek.
China struggling to root out community transmission
China remains the only major economy struggling to stamp out every instance of community transmission of the coronavirus, nearly three years into the pandemic. President Xi Jinping’s “Dynamic zero COVID”, public health strategy is reportedly putting serious strain on the economy and on the livelihoods of Chinese citizens in an apparent trade-off for social stability.
China’s National Health Commission reported 31,444 new infections across the country on Wednesday, relatively low by international standards but a record high for the Chinese government. However, serious cases remain rare and deaths even more so, with only one death recorded over the same 24-hour period.
As per the Newsweek report, new field hospitals and large centralised quarantine facilities are still under construction in major Chinese cities including the capital Beijing. Meanwhile, around one-quarter of China’s 1.4 billion population is living under some form of lockdown.
The Viral WeChat post was reportedly made by an “ordinary citizen” questioning the number of public resources spent in recording COVID cases in comparison to promoting the effect of therapeutics. Furthermore, concerns were raised by the author on why China had not allowed the reopening of Hong Kong in September despite concerns from the region’s elderly population.