According to insiders, after violent protests against the strict pandemic policy, China is relaxing its strict corona rules. For example, certain people who have tested positive for Covid-19 should be allowed to quarantine at home. Two people familiar with the matter said they would not be named. This innovation should be published together with other measures in the coming days.
It would be a fundamental change to China’s “zero Covid policy”, which has been very strictly enforced up to now. At the beginning of the year, entire districts or cities were isolated if only a single corona infection was diagnosed. People had to go into quarantine in temporary isolation camps or hospitals, and most recently factory halls and workers’ accommodation on company premises were also completely isolated.
That should change now. However, not all those who tested positive are allowed to spend their quarantine at home, said an insider. Pregnant women, the elderly and people with underlying illnesses are intended for home isolation, as well as those who are in close contact with them. However, the home environment must meet certain conditions, it said. The National Health Commission of the People’s Republic has not yet commented.
The state media, which for years has been demonizing the virus and showing the devastation and death toll in Western countries, is now putting the survival of Covid-19 at the forefront. This is how they want to calm people who have frightened them, the news agency suspects Bloomberg. Politics is also striking a new tone: “As the omicron variant is less pathogenic, more people are being vaccinated and our experience in Covid prevention is increasing, our fight against the pandemic is in a new phase and brings with it new tasks Vice Premier Sun Chunlan said at a meeting with the National Health Commission and health experts in Beijing.
Because of the strict zero-Covid policy, with which the government of President Xi Jinping has been trying to curb the spread of the corona virus for almost three years, demonstrators have taken to the streets in the past few days. Public protests against the government and President Xi are rare in China, and the recent spate of civil disobedience is unprecedented.