China virus cases at six-month high despite grinding lockdowns

BEIJING: China reported its highest daily Covid caseload in six months on Monday, despite grinding lockdowns that have heavily disrupted manufacturing, education and day-to-day life.

Beijing over the weekend quashed hopes that its strict zero-Covid policy -- in which spot lockdowns, quarantines and mass testing are employed to quash outbreaks -- might be relaxed anytime soon.

But a torrent of lockdown-related scandals where residents have complained of inadequate conditions, food shortages and delayed emergency medical care have chipped away at public confidence.

The country logged more than 5,600 new Covid cases on Monday -- almost half in Guangdong province, a southern manufacturing hub home to major ports. In Beijing, almost 60 new infections were discovered, causing school closures in the populous downtown district of Chaoyang. Some companies also asked their staff to work from home temporarily.

This was despite city authorities saying Monday that recent “successive outbreaks” had “basically been effectively controlled”, after daily new cases reached dozens in the past week. And in central China, a grueling lockdown at the world´s biggest iPhone factory in Zhengzhou led Apple Sunday to warn that production had been “temporarily impacted” and that customers would experience delays in receiving their orders.

“The facility is currently operating at significantly reduced capacity,” the California-based tech titan said in a statement. Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn -- Apple´s principal subcontractor which runs the plant -- revised down its quarterly earnings forecast Monday due to the lockdown.

China´s National Health Commission vowed on Saturday to “unswervingly” stick to zero-Covid, dashing a major stock market rally last week on the back of unsubstantiated rumours that Beijing would imminently loosen its strict virus policy. But a number of high-profile incidents have chipped away at the Chinese public´s support for the approach.

The death by suicide of a 55-year-old woman in the locked-down city of Hohhot, Inner Mongolia, sparked widespread outcry over the weekend after authorities admitted that lockdown protocols delayed their emergency response.