China battles worst Covid-19 outbreak in 2 years, as country faces fresh lockdown

Two days after ordering a lockdown of the 9 million residents of the northeastern city of Changchun amid a new spike in Covid-19 cases, China on Sunday (March 13, 2022) shut down another city, Shenzhen, which has a population of over 17 million, to control the recent surge of coronavirus infections. The high-tech Shenzhen city will seal all communities, villages and suspend bus and metro services from Monday to Sunday due to the latest Covid-19 outbreak. In a statement, city authorities urged the residents to work from home and to step out only to buy daily necessities.

The situation is such that China is on the brink of its biggest Covid-19 crisis since Wuhan, a report has claimed. The coronavirus is said to have first broken out in Wuhan in December 2019 before it spread to almost all parts of the world. In Shanghai, China's most populous city with 24 million people, the number of Covid-19 cases in the latest surge rose by 15 to 432. The city government called on the public not to leave unless necessary. The recent spike in cases has also forced authorities to close schools in Shanghai and put several northeastern cities under lockdown as various provinces continue to fight the Omicron variant.