COVID-19: China to ban dog meat and other updates

The China Project illustration by Derek Zheng

The consumption of dog meat in China may soon be coming to an end, following the release of a draft policy that would see canine meat banned by the agricultural ministry. This is a direct consequence of worries that unregulated wildlife and other meat markets in China were a primary factor in the emergence of COVID-19.

Other COVID-19 updates:

• Wuhan was officially released from its 76-day lockdown on April 8, and while this is good news, life in the Hubei capital doesn’t look set to return to normal anytime soon, with movement remaining regulated and residents anxious over the outbreak’s potential long term implications.
• Beijing continued its efforts to prevent a second wave of COVID-19 within China’s borders. These efforts have been accompanied by propaganda work at home and abroad, as reports continue to cast doubt over the accuracy of China’s official COVID-19 case numbers.
• Part of these propaganda efforts include a sanitized timeline of China’s COVID-19 response, recently published on Xinhua. The timeline, which omits key information, is clearly intended to counter the narrative that China covered up the outbreak and to promote China as a responsible steward of global public health.
• Russia’s worsening epidemic is now spilling over into China, and authorities are taking strict measures to reverse the trend, per Sixth Tone.