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Shanghai disinfects homes, closes all subways in COVID fight

30 Comments
By KEN MORITSUGU

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30 Comments
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As Shanghai is close to Korea, Japan and Taiwan, something is going on there.

-16 ( +1 / -17 )

@BackpackingNepal

As Shanghai is close to Korea, Japan and Taiwan, something is going on there.

Something like Geography?

16 ( +19 / -3 )

As Shanghai is close to Korea, Japan and Taiwan, something is going on there.

If it was further away would less be going on there?

14 ( +15 / -1 )

Elvis is hereToday  04:10 pm JST

With all this continuous heavy-handedness, the said zero policy is clearly not working. 

How do you define "not working"?

*The daily number of new cases in Shanghai fell to about 3,000 on Monday, down from a peak of 26,000 in mid-April.*

-13 ( +4 / -17 )

Covid like a sense of freedom is hard to eradicate, spray those chemicals in a month people will want freedom and Covid will be back. Neither will be eradicated by a law.

8 ( +8 / -0 )

China's economy is taking a serious pounding. But still no sign of giving up the zero-covid approach.

11 ( +13 / -2 )

The Zero-COVID does not work.

Shanghai is one of the worlds largest manufacturing cities. So if the Chinese slow products coming out of Shanghai it causes economic downturn for the rest of the planet.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

It is simple China wants to squeeze the World by distributing the inflation.

No, that reflects more of you to come up with that and doesn’t sound like the Chinese I know. They are doing zero tolerance because they’re kind of crazy and don’t back down from something they want to will into reality. Here are examples:

A man standing against a long row of tanks in Tiananmen 1989

Greening deserts - you should see the before and after pictures.

Locking 25 million people in their homes in Shanghai to eliminate the virus.

Their dopamine comes from taking on gargantuan projects like damning the Three Gorges, One Belt One Road, extracting helium from the moon and so on.

Conniving secretly to use a Covid lockdown to reduce supply in order to hurt other nations by inflation is too convoluted and more a narrative of other countries, whose people like evil plot twists and conspiracies.

The Chinese, imo, love to suffer and then overcome all obstacles. They absolutely love David Copperfield walking all the way to Dover until his feet bled. They love Rudy getting into the game at Notre Dame. They identify with Jane Eyre bullied by Aunt Reed yet visits her on her death bed to forgive her not to mention returning to Thornfield.

Your theory is more Lady MacBeth, or Iago, Claudius, Edmund, Richard III, Cassius, Shylock and so on, none of whom are admired by the Chinese.

It’s the against all odds and Chariots of Fire in their blood that accounts for the lockdown in Shanghai.

-5 ( +0 / -5 )

They know exactly how to treat it right while the big whole rest doesn’t. Ask yourself why they have already 6,000 years of history and high developed civilization and everyone else hasn’t and with such blind stubbornness , including thoughts of opening up everything and dreams of a lovely and peaceful coexistence with those little cute viruses, they all also won’t reach nearly a few thousand years, I generously tell and warn you in advance. In fact, the Chinese will live with the viruses and all other areas don’t but will die earlier than necessary and step by step become extinguished. Now all you little no brainers, I am ready for your amoeba like argumentations and other massive flak fire. Convince me why you still can.

-2 ( +2 / -4 )

Spraying people’s houses down is not going to have any positive impact, just ruining some furniture and making people sick from chemicals.

6 ( +7 / -1 )

Its amazing that 2 and a half years of complete failure for every lockdown policy in the world has been completely lost on China.

The CCP knows one thing and one thing only;

Brutality.

1 ( +4 / -3 )

"Ask yourself why they have already 6,000 years of history and high developed civilization and everyone else hasn’t and with such blind stubbornness"

Ah yes the old "6 thousand years of history" canard. It’s a phrase repeated by both the Xi the Pooh faction in the CCP and non-Chinese apologists of the CCP. Somehow we are supposed to believe that China has more history than other places. A slightly strange concept anyway, and, regardless of whether you want to define “history” as starting with written records or by the emergence of “civilization” as seen in the first large settlements, the 6000 years drivel is wrong.

The Shang dynasty (founded around 1600 BC) of the Yellow River valley in northern China is as far back as we have solid archaeological settlement evidence and positive proof of the first written records. Earlier than that, history disintegrates into mythology. But even if you accept the preceding mythical Xia dynasty as the start, it takes you back only to around 2000 BC.

In terms of age, civilizations in other parts of the world precede China. Writing systems in Egypt and Mesopotamia predate Chinese writing by 1500 years. The world’s first city, Uruk, in modern-day Iraq, dates back 7000 years. Even in comparison to Europe, China isn’t that old. Confucius’ life overlapped with those of Pythagoras and Socrates. China was first unified in 221 BC, a century after Alexander the Great had created the Hellenistic Empire, and just a few centuries before the zenith of the Roman Empire.

As far as their nation is concerned, Mao and his Great Leap Backward ... oops, Forward, destroyed so many written and archatecture records that the practitioners of Traditional Medicine must get the recipes from the ancient temples here in Japan as they were all destroyed. Plans for traditional building must be gotten from Japan as well. Aside from the Great Wall there is practically no evidence left that was not recorded and saved outside China before the CCP and the brutal Mao regime came to power.

So yeah, keep peddling those CCP canards.

2 ( +4 / -2 )

Spraying disinfectant achieves absolutely nothing useful.. But party cadre can say they are "doing something". The Communist Party Chief of Shanghai, Li Qiang, is a very close ally of Xi Jinping and will do whatever he can to make his boss look good.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

"Ask yourself why they have already 6,000 years of history and high developed civilization and everyone else hasn’t and with such blind stubbornness"

What you get are people like my wife who grew up during the Cultural Revolution who are absolutely certain beyond any doubt that all the things she was taught them are true and that Americans know nothing. She will claim there is something called "Sun poison", that strong sunlight possesses some sort of poison that makes you sick. She will not consider the idea that you can suffer heat exhaustion or heat stroke. No, it is "Sun poison" This is a woman with a BSEE btw who does complex modeling and simulation on rockets. She insists cold air makes you sick. If you try to tell her the only way you catch a cold is to contract the virus she scoffs. How could I be so stupid? Oh wait, I'm an American and how long have we been a nation? She insists cold water is bad for you and makes your sick to the stomach. Cold anything is verboten during her period. When our boy was born there was this elaborate month of isolation with all these special foods I had to buy. She would not wash her hair the whole month because it was somehow bad for her health to do so. Neither she nor the boy could leave the bedroom, and I was banished from the bedroom! She brews up these horrible smelling things in a clay pot as "medicine". The stuff looks like yard trimmings and smells absolutely vile as it brews. And it is equally awful to drink. But western medicine is, to her, garbage and scientists know nothing. Only China knows medicine. I could go on but you get the idea of where this 6000 years of history chauvinism goes.

5 ( +5 / -0 )

Well done.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

They may as well be doing it for flu. Covid is endemic and may not go away. There is nothing to stop the commenters who are applauding the Chinese approach from copying it, staying inside, avoiding contact and having their food delivered. They should make it clear that they are doing this in their comments. Or are they being hypocritical, with pro-Covid zero comments, whilst taking advantage of their own freedom to roam, shop and work.?

Governments around the world have switched away from lockdowns because it isn't viable. But anyone who wants to follow the Chinese model is welcome to. Nobody is forcing you to go back to normal. You want to promote the Chinese way, fine. But have the courage of your convictions and live like it yourselves.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Stay the course Shanghai. The rest of the world does not have the discipline to help prevent further infections and covid related deaths. And as a result, other countries are experiencing vastly higher covid infection and related death rates.

They are putting their economies ahead of the safety of their citizens.

At the same time China's economy is the only on experiencing positive growth since the start of the epidemic.

New Zealand and Australia, for example, are both suffering from stunted economic growth and some of the highest infection rates in the world.

China is doing fine and will come out of this ahead of every other country.

-4 ( +1 / -5 )

The Chinese government freaks me out bro.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Forget about Taiwan and the military. The Japanese should just mail the Shanghainese the same virus every week to keep them all locked up and weak. To win a war without firing a single bullet.

-3 ( +1 / -4 )

As Shanghai is close to Korea, Japan and Taiwan, something is going on there.

I can assure you that things happen all over the world every day. Shanghai isn't the center of the universe, unless you live there. Just like Tokyo is the center of the universe for people who live there.

Haven't we learned that 14 days of isolation is enough to get over mild versions of COVID? Perhaps I'm just dumb, but tell people there will be a 14 day lock down for non-health essential workers beginning in a week. Tell everyone to stock up and get all the grocery stores over stocked to support everyone, young, old, sick, well, to stock up on food for the next 3 weeks. Ensure the logistics supports that.

Next week, add 1 more day, then tell everyone to stay home. Only essential health workers allowed out - people under age 35 (typically get mild cases). Anyone who goes out should self-quarantine from others in their households. Fire, police, ambulances, and medical people would be essential people.

14 days. Everyone stays home. People who have covid should self-report their status every 3 days - for tracking purposes. The Chinese CDC should sample sewers for traces of COVID from toilets to get an idea how prevalent it is.

When the 14 days are up, regardless of the situation, let everrone go out, stock up, but ask people who think they've been sick in the last 5 days to get friends/relatives to bring them some food. Send official test teams to neighborhood locations for the self-reported to get tested. Use appointments, social distancing, masks. Help the lines stay 2m apart by having chalk lines. In the US, we did something like this, but because we all have cars, we just stayed in our vehicles in the lines for testing. Safer for the testers and the testees. We did have appointments with 15 minute windows to help spread out when people showed up. Not perfect, but better than nothing.

In a few days, they will know who, where, caught covid during the lockdown. Better decisions can be made with that data.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

Stay the course Shanghai. The rest of the world does not have the discipline to help prevent further infections and covid related deaths. And as a result, other countries are experiencing vastly higher covid infection and related death rates.

Sure lock everyone down and people with chronic medical conditions, who need dialysis or cancer treatments are left to slowly die because they can't get out. Mama in Shanghai can't get one of her medicines and cannot go to see any of her doctors. Getting in a vehicle with strangers scares her, which is reasonable considering what would happen to her if she has the misfortune to ever test positive for Covid-19. If she does get sick the only family member with a car is likewise locked down and cannot help her. Nobody can now. She's locked down and on her own, an 86yo woman with multiple medical problems.

The Chinese have no idea what their true death rate is because if someone has any other medical condition regardless of how minor, contracts Covid-19 and dies, the death is not attributed to Covid-19. It is instead attributed to whatever other medical condition the victim had regardless of whether or not that pre-existing condition was something that could kill you. Lots and lots of Chinese have had Covid and never been diagnosed.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

At the same time China's economy is the only on experiencing positive growth since the start of the epidemic.

China's economic data is unreliable. No party cadre is going to admit negative growth. To do so would be career ending. There is no reward in the CCP for honesty in the face of adversity. It's all about making one's boss, one's patron look good to the Central Committee so everyone gets promoted.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

@kyushubill Your good history knowledge and arguments very much appreciated and maybe good for discussion later or on other topics, but still the fact stands that the Chinese have seen and will see come and / or go all those other empires you enumerated, at least they already have outnumbered them by factors in population and global political or economical influence, in case you would insist that also Egypt or Iraq or Rome are still on the maps. lol And of course please don’t mix it with their current political system or CCP. That’s nothing I or anyone else has or should have sympathy for. Maybe you misunderstood that part.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

What you get are people like my wife who grew up during the Cultural Revolution who are absolutely certain beyond any doubt that all the things she was taught them are true and that Americans know nothing. She will claim there is something called "Sun poison", that strong sunlight possesses some sort of poison that makes you sick. She will not consider the idea that you can suffer heat exhaustion or heat stroke. No, it is "Sun poison" This is a woman with a BSEE btw who does complex modeling and simulation on rockets. She insists cold air makes you sick. If you try to tell her the only way you catch a cold is to contract the virus she scoffs. How could I be so stupid? Oh wait, I'm an American and how long have we been a nation? She insists cold water is bad for you and makes your sick to the stomach. Cold anything is verboten during her period. When our boy was born there was this elaborate month of isolation with all these special foods I had to buy. She would not wash her hair the whole month because it was somehow bad for her health to do so. Neither she nor the boy could leave the bedroom, and I was banished from the bedroom! She brews up these horrible smelling things in a clay pot as "medicine". The stuff looks like yard trimmings and smells absolutely vile as it brews. And it is equally awful to drink. But western medicine is, to her, garbage and scientists know nothing. Only China knows medicine. I could go on but you get the idea of where this 6000 years of history chauvinism goes.

Try and stay on topic.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

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