China Newsbase
Fast, easy search of the China news that matters
The China News Database was last updated at 01:50PM on November 9, 2023.
Database searches currently perform best when a tag filter is used. We suggest trying out these tags: Xi Jinping, Russia, Taiwan, COVID-19, climate change, electric vehicles, gaming, IPOs, Belt and Road Initiative.
You may also filter by articles featured in our daily members-only Access newsletter, to get a curated overview of the top news and analysis about Chinese politics, business, and society. Select one option:
- All top news and analysis
- The China Project top news and analysis
- Top news and analysis from elsewhere — Stories in the “News briefing,” previously known as “Recommended links”
This product is in beta testing and development. If you would like to share feedback on the content or user experience, please email editors@thechinaproject.com.
44 articles matching the search query.
新华述评：坚持“动态清零”不放松-新华网
State news agency Xinhua reaffirmed China’s commitment to COVID zero in an editorial released on March 30, appearing to end speculation that the country will shift its long-standing strategy of mass lockdowns, testing, and contact tracing to tackle the widespread Omicron outbreak.
Meanwhile, weary Shanghai residents are panic-buying as the city struggles to curb the economic fallout over its largest lockdown since the start of the pandemic.
Shanghai COVID lockdown holds up more than a dozen IPOs
At least 16 companies have pushed back their planned initial public offerings on Shanghai’s tech-focused STAR market and Shenzhen’s ChiNext bourse over the latest lockdowns. The companies include device maker Nanjing Cigu Technology and auto supplier Zhejiang Sling Automobile Bearing.
China’s PBOC Vows to Boost Confidence, Support Economy in Monetary Policy
In a sign of how worried Beijing is about the slowing economy, China’s central bank promised “to boost confidence and provide more effective support to the economy, amid mounting growth pressure from the country’s worst COVID outbreak since Wuhan.”
Meanwhile, five of China’s biggest banks said “the country’s lenders face multiple headwinds this year that include the pandemic, global politics and domestic turmoil in the real estate industry.” To make matters worse, Shanghai has gone into COVID-19 lockdown.
Foxconn 'basically' resumes normal operations in China's Shenzhen
Foxconn has resumed some of its operations in Shenzhen after the city emerged from lockdown last week following disruptions caused by COVID-19 outbreaks, per Nikkei Asia.
China reports first COVID-19 deaths in more than a year
China reported its first COVID deaths in over a year, as challenges mount on the nation’s COVID-zero policy. The two deaths recorded in northeastern Jilin Province on March 19 bring the country’s coronavirus death toll to 4,638. (The death toll in the U.S. stands at 970,082 today.)
More than 4,000 new infections were reported across China on Sunday, with two thirds in Jilin Province. Shenzhen has eased its lockdown restrictions, citing control over the outbreak. Widely used inactivated shots have been updated to fight up to three variants, said Zhèng Zhōngwěi 郑忠伟, an official who oversees COVID vaccine development at the National Health Commission.
《新型冠状病毒肺炎诊疗方案（试行第九版）》修订要点_部门政务_中国政府网
China added Paxlovid to the country’s COVID treatment list, authorities announced this week, as the highly transmissible Omicron variant challenges the nation’s COVID-zero policy. Regulators approved the Pfizer pill last month for emergency use.
China Updates Quarantine Rules, Treatments for COVID-19 Patients
China has updated its rules on COVID-19 after almost a year, relaxing quarantine and hospital admission policies for those who test positive for the virus, as Omicron challenges the nation’s strict COVID-zero policy.
Health officials reported 3,054 domestic coronavirus cases on Wednesday, lower than the 5,154 local infections — the country’s largest daily toll since 2020 — logged the day before.
Covid in China: Shanghai Urges Bankers to Work From Home, Rules Out Lockdown
Shanghai has become the latest test for China’s COVID-zero policies, with a record 758 new cases on Sunday (734 asymptomatic), double the cases from two days earlier. Large segments of the city have been locked down, classes have moved online, and incoming flights have been rerouted. Last week, the city ruled out imposing a broad stay-at-home order, but officials said on Monday that some areas will remain locked down.
Shanghai Disney Resort has also temporarily shut down due to COVID concerns.
COVID-19 cases more than double in China's growing outbreak
China’s COVID-19 cases more than doubled in a day, with 3,507 new local identified cases in the latest 24-hour period, up from 1,337 a day earlier.
Shanghai has “no plan” to go into complete lockdown, the government said on Tuesday. However, the city has diverted more than 100 international flights and locked down the Shanghai Sixth People’s Hospital on March 6 over an “abnormal” nucleic acid test. Beijing has suspended in-person classes for after-school training institutions, authorities said on Monday, after reports of five confirmed new cases, including two students. New lockdowns and pandemic restrictions have stymied operations for suppliers to Toyota, Volkswagen, and Apple, and threaten to disrupt global supply chains.Yesterday on SupChina: Major cities lock down as Omicron breaks through China’s defenses.
China fights new COVID-19 spike with more selective approach
Omicron is pushing China to reconsider COVID zero, as authorities use less strict control measures, such as more selective lockdowns, to curb recent COVID outbreaks.
However, the chances for a working homegrown mRNA vaccine in the near future are dim, after its front-runner failed to reach the market last year and is now showing disappointing results against the Omicron variant.Earlier on SupChina: Is China shifting from COVID zero to coexistence?
Zhang Wenhong: How to Beat Covid-19 With a Smarter Zero-Covid Policy
Another signal that China may readjust COVID zero: Zhāng Wénhóng 张文宏, a Chinese doctor and Beijing’s trusted voice on COVID-19, says that the pandemic has reached a “new stage” and that China must “avoid a single approach aimed at eliminating all cases at the cost of normal life.”
Meanwhile, Shanghai is testing tens of thousands of people, delaying events, and shutting some public venues amid a rising wave of local symptomless cases.
China Reports Most COVID-19 Cases Since Early Days of Pandemic
China reported the highest daily COVID tally since the start of the pandemic, with a total of 526 cases on Sunday scattered across the country. Experts have suggested “a new stage of COVID-19 control” as the Omicron surge challenges the nation’s strict COVID-zero policy.
Shanghai, which had a total of 48 local cases, launched mass testing in residential neighborhoods with reported infections.
Yang Liu on Twitter
Will China shift from COVID zero? Zēng Guāng 曾光, the former chief epidemiologist of China’s CDC, signaled a change that the policy “will not remain forever” and that co-existing with the virus is a long-term goal, state-backed Xinhua reporter Yang Liu said on Twitter.
Earlier on SupChina: China clears Pfizer’s COVID pill.
Hong Kong Pharmacies Run Out of Flu Meds Amid Panic Buying
Hongkongers are panic-buying cold and flu medication, Bloomberg reports, while a number of other residents scramble to figure a way out amid the city’s most recent COVID outbreak. The surge in cases poses an even greater threat to Hong Kong’s vulnerable elderly population, where “more than 200 people have died this month from COVID, many of whom were over 70 and unvaccinated.”
Last week on SupChina: Hong Kong intensifies COVID control measures amid Omicron wave, pushing residents to the brink.
China Planning Post Covid-Zero Policy; 71 Cases in Eight Provinces Monday
Is there light at the end of China’s COVID-zero tunnel? Wú Zūnyǒu 吳尊友, the chief epidemiologist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, seems to think so, after he said he was cautiously optimistic that the pandemic will end this year.
According to Wu, Chinese health officials are developing an approach that is “neither the current ‘zero cases’ policy nor laissez-faire” to put “people first and life first.”See also last week on SupChina: China clears Pfizer’s COVID pill.
China’s Immunity Gap
What is the future of China’s COVID policy? Yanzhong Huang, a scholar of public health in China, writes critically in Foreign Affairs of what he views as China’s overemphasis on virus elimination and underemphasis on building up population immunity and “surge capacity” to handle a possibly inevitable wave of cases. As China moves toward reopening, it “could make effective COVID-19 antiviral pills widely available, and it could immediately approve the use of mRNA vaccines as booster shots for those who are immunosuppressed or over 65,” among other measures, to “reestablish a sustainable balance between protecting public health and allowing social and economic life to return to a normal trajectory.”
A comparison between COVID control in China and U.S.
Here’s a different view on China’s COVID policy: The Pekingnology newsletter has a translation of a January 18 post (in Chinese) by popular WeChat account Rèn Yì 任意, a.k.a. Chairman Rabbit, defending Beijing’s approach to COVID management.
China tests 2M in Beijing, lifts COVID lockdown in Xi’an
The lockdown in Xi’an has lifted, even as Beijing buckles down for the Olympics, which starts in less than two weeks. “Officials in Beijing said they would conduct a second round of mass testing of the Fengtai district’s 2 million residents, where the majority of the capital’s 40 coronavirus cases since January 15 have been found,” the Associated Press reports.
Hong Kong’s ‘Draconian’ Travel Curbs Are Top AmCham Concern
Foreign executives are leaving Hong Kong as the city continues its strict “COVID-zero” measures. “Hong Kong’s stringent travel restrictions are now the biggest challenge for American businesses and expatriates in the city, with 44% of respondents in a new survey [by the American Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong] saying they’re likely to leave,” Bloomberg reported last week. The Wall Street Journal has a new report on the situation, noting that the International Monetary Fund “estimated that the city’s rebounding economy could suffer [if strict COVID containment measures continue], with growth slowing to 3% this year, down from last year’s 6.4%.”
