One year after the first known cases of coronavirus, preventive measures against covid are almost a memory in Wuhan, although its inhabitants do not forget or wonder how a pandemic began to spread that still has the entire planet in check.
No case of local contagion since mid-May on public transport in the capital of Hubei Province, located in the center of the Asian country, Rapid Recognition (QR) health codes that ensure that a person is not infected are no longer needed and the use of masks has decreased since the massive closure the city suffered last January.
WUHANI BELIEVE THAT THE CONCLUSION WAS NECESSARY
On the contrary, residents are preparing to inaugurate the year 2021, which will be marked by a complete closure of the city for 11 weeks, which, according to its inhabitants, was the only possible measure to prevent the spread of covid even more and continue to do so. thing. havoc.
“At first, when I read the first news, I didn’t take it seriously. But when it became known that (the coronavirus) was transmitted between people, we began to understand what was happening and how terrible it could be,” he says. for Efe a recently retired neighbor, Hong, who now spends his days flying kites on the banks of the Yangtze River.
His gesture twists when he remembers the hardest moments, which he has not yet forgotten. The worst, he says, occurred when relatives, friends or co-workers began to become infected without really knowing what was going on: “In the end, a person or a family is not important. spread without further ado, without distinction, and therefore the measures they have taken to control it. “
After 11 sealed weeks, the virtual absence of new cases led authorities to lift the restrictions in April.
In addition to the prison, Wuhan managed to reverse the situation due to the arrival of materials and staff from other Chinese provinces, strong preventive measures or the express construction of hospitals such as Leishenshan, which began hospitalizing patients in February.
THE ORIGIN OF THE VIRUS, THE THEME OF THE TABLE
A young woman who prefers not to give her name adds that many people in the city feel guilty that Wuhan recorded the first cases of the then so-called “mysterious outbreak of pneumonia”, although she points out “almost no one wants to talk about it”.
“In those days, just launched in 2020, many residents avoided the subject and many protected each other to avoid knowing who was infected,” he says.
He believes it will be “very, very difficult” to know what happened or how the pandemic occurred, but celebrates the fact that, despite sporadic outbreaks, China has managed to keep it virtually under control, with no deaths since May.
He also recalls the confusion that prevailed in the early stages of the outbreak and that it was not until February that the city authorities acknowledged that it took too long to disclose the available information, as they said they needed the approval of higher authorities to makes them public. .
He also ignores the case of citizen journalist Zhang Zhan, who was sentenced today to four years in prison by a Shanghai court for “provoking altercations and searching for problems”, reporting the arrests of other independent reporters and harassing the families of the victims. of coronavirus during outbreak.
According to the human rights organization (CHRD), the woman was arrested a few months ago for publishing that people in Wuhan received rotten food during detention or were forced to pay fees to be tested for nucleic acid.
Meanwhile, the official press pointed out that the initial outbreak of the pandemic could have been linked to imports of frozen food or appeared earlier in other countries, while authorities reiterated their desire to cooperate with the World Health Organization. (WHO) for a group of experts to travel to the Asian country in January to investigate the origin of the virus.
It is not known whether this trip will stop at the Huanan Seafood Market, which has been closed since January 1 this year and on which the WHO is debating whether “it was the source of contamination, whether it acted as an amplifier for human contagion.” in humans or if it was a combination of these factors. “