China: ‘Zero Covid’ outlier imposes more lockdowns as coronavirus infections hit record high

China expanded lockdowns on Thursday as the only major country in the world still pursuing a strict “zero Covid” policy reported a record high number of coronavirus infections.

In the city of Zhengzhou, more than six million residents in eight districts were told to stay at home for five days, except to buy food or get medical treatment.

Daily mass testing was ordered in what the city government called a “war of annihilation” against the virus.

Across China, the number of new cases reported in the past 24 hours was 31,444, the National Health Commission said Thursday. That is the highest daily figure since the coronavirus was first detected in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019.

The daily average of reported cases is steadily increasing. This week, authorities reported China’s first Covid-19 deaths in six months, bringing the total to 5,232.

While the numbers of cases and deaths are relatively low compared to most of Europe and the US, China remains committed to President Xi’s signature “zero-Covid” strategy that aims to isolate every case and eliminate the virus entirely. Most of the rest of the world is ending anti-virus controls and relying on vaccinations and immunity from past infections to prevent deaths and serious illness.

Businesses and residential communities from the manufacturing center of Guangzhou in the south to Beijing in the north have also been placed under various forms of lockdown, measures that particularly affects blue-collar migrant workers.

Guangzhou suspended access on Monday to its Baiyun district of 3.7 million residents, while residents of some areas of Shijiazhuang, a city of 11 million people southwest of Beijing, were told to stay home while mass testing is conducted.

China’s attempts to clamp down on Covid infections has cast a shadow over the world’s second-biggest economy.

Foxconn, the world's biggest contract assembler of smartphones and other electronics, is struggling to fill orders for the iPhone 14 after thousands of employees walked away from the factory in Zhengzhou last month following complaints about unsafe working conditions.

The factory has seen clashes between workers and police this week amid complaints about pay.

Foxconn, based in Taiwan, said its contractual obligation about payments “has always been fulfilled”.