Coronavirus Pandemic: China Plans to Reopen Wuhan

The past few months have been really difficult for many countries infected with the coronavirus especially hotspots like Wuhan. For the past 11 weeks, the Chinese city of Wuhan has been on lockdown following the coronavirus outbreak. The Chinese authority recently announced its intentions to reopen Wuhan and the rest of the world is concerned. The concern sparks from the fact that the Covid-19 is still on a rampage, daily expanding its reach to many global cities.

The Wuhan lockdown would come to an end on April 8. After a long strict lockdown of the city which confined over 11 million people to their homes for the past 11 weeks. Global scientists are working tirelessly to find a permanent cure to the Covid-19 and are afraid that with the reopening of Wuhan new cases of the virus would emerge. Some Chinese experts and Wuhan locals believe that the virus has not been fully eradicated as the Chinese government claims. Some other experts fear a “boomerang effect” might just occur if the Wuhan is reopened.

The reopening of Wuhan does not only allow citizens to cautiously resume their daily activities but also allows traffic in and out of the city. Meaning Wuhan would once again become a passage for those outside the province to connect with the rest of China or the world. This may be the case in China, however, there is no assurance yet that other countries would lift the travel ban from all hotspot areas, especially China.

Since January 23, residents of Wuhan have been on intense lockdown allowing only special workers like delivery and hospital workers, and the police to roam the streets cautiously. Every 72 hours, only one person from each home is allowed to step out of the house to purchase home supplies and medical supplies. Those infected and in self-quarantine have their food and medications delivered to their doors to avoid spreading of the virus. To ensure that everyone adheres to the lockdown rule, armed police patrol the streets to monitor the lockdown and all authorized movements.

Since the outbreak in December, China has recorded over 80,745 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and 3,136 deaths.

On Tuesday, China’s President Xi Jinping, for the first time since the outbreak visited the city of Wuhan. During his visit, he inspected the epidemic prevention and control work in Hubei and Wuhan, and declared that the spread of the virus had been “basically curbed.”

“Initial success has been made in stabilizing the situation and turning the tide in Hubei and Wuhan,” he added.

In addition to his conclusions, the state media also affirmed “that China is ascending out of the darkest moment amid the outbreak.” Also, the state media confirmed that the 14 temporary hospitals built for coronavirus patients had been closed.