Some 26 million residents of China’s economic capital of Shanghai will be confined to their homes as Beijing imposes a massive citywide lockdown starting on Monday in a bid to maintain a ‘zero-Covid’ policy.
The lockdown will be conducted in two phases. First, Shanghai’s Pudong financial district and nearby areas will be quarantined from Monday to Friday. Second, Pudong will pass the baton to the vast downtown area west of the Huangpu River, which will start its own five-day lockdown on Friday.
To control the growing outbreak, the lockdown will be accompanied by a new round of mass nucleic acid testing across the city, China’s Xinhua reported, citing Shanghai officials. Beijing recorded 3,500 cases of the infection on Sunday.