How The Covid Lockdown In Shanghai Has Spun Into Chaos

China's zero-COVID policy has locked residents in their homes for way longer than initially planned. Now it's created urgent problems for citizens.

China has been seeing its largest surge of COVID cases since 2020. In response, the government has enacted similar strict city-wide lockdowns again.

In many cases, this lockdown means not being able to leave the house at all — even to get food or supplies. Public transport is shut down, and even hospitals may be closed to non-COVID patients.

These city-wide shutdowns are the core of China’s zero-COVID approach, meaning "zero active cases and zero new cases every day." The policy locks down full cities at a time, with regular intensive testing, tracing and isolating of anyone who tests positive.