Fire in Urumqi

In Urumqi, Xinjiang’s capital, 10 people were killed by a deadly fire in an apartment building. The news said the cause of death were the heat and toxic fumes, but for everyone paying attention, it’s obvious that the fire bears no blame in this deadly accident. The true killer is the government and their zero-covid policy.

Footage online as shown that a lockdown has stalled the rescue effort. In many videos of the accidents, the water from a fire hose weren’t able to reach close enough to put out the flame because of the cars parked in the area. Many said the cars cannot be moved since many of their owners are under quarantine in a different area any many of them had been parked for such a long time during lockdown, their engine cannot be started. What’s more horrifying is that some rumors suggested the front door of the apartment building may be sealed before the accident. Local government officials has denied this in their press releases, but sealing doors or setting up barricades are common practices in lockdown areas to prevent potential covid patients from going outside and spreading the virus.

This case is not a simple mismanagement by the local government. It’s just one in many cases of hurt and death caused by the zero covid policy that has gone way too far. Back in September, a late night bus crashed while taking people to quarantine killing 27 passengers. The driver was required to wear a hazmat suit that could obstruct his field of view and had to work for long hours late night due to the volume of people need to be send to quarantine. In spring this year, quarantine in Shanghai caused a shortage of food and medical resources. Hospitals with many empty beds were forced to turn away patients who lived in “high risk areas”. The mayor of Shanghai was never held accountable. Instead, he was promoted to top leadership in CCP, second only to president Xi.

The terrible effects of zero covid policy are wide spread enough that they are felt by all my friends and family in China. Many of my high school classmates complained that their schools are locked down for absolutely no reason. They are not allowed to go outside the school for an entire semester, and sometimes allowed to shower. My parents told be last week that all the hospitals around them were closed because of covid lockdown. When I asked them where do people go when they are sick, my father said, “they stay at home, and wait to get better”. I was lucky enough to not be in China during these lockdowns. Still, I wasn’t able to go home or meet my parents because of limits on number of international flights to China and the strict traveling policy. I was close to coming home this summer, but my flight was canceled a few days before take off due to high number of people infected on the last flight from L.A. to Beijing.

The fire in Urumqi is the last straw for those who are sick of never ending quarantines. For the first time that I can remember, mass protests were seen in multiple parts of China. People in China are expressing their anger and sadness on the internet and in the streets. In Urumqi, protestors surrounded local government building demanding a stop to the lockdown. In Shanghai, people gather in Urumqi Street, which carries the same name as the city where the accident happened, to mourn the dead and voicing their dissent. College students all over the country are putting up anti-government posters on their campuses. Large protest can also be seen in many schools.

It is easy to forget how difficult it is to start a protest under an authoritarian regime. I’ve seen countless posts blaming Russians for not standing up agains Putin as if it is as easy as just walking down the street. All these protesters are doing it against all the treats and against all their instincts. Since I was little I was told by my teacher and my parents to stay away from activism and just trust the CCP. It wasn’t a bad advice, since these protests can have grave consequences. Last major anti-government protest ended with a massacre in Tiananmen Square. Right now, the students are already being threatened with blacklist from government agencies who are the only ones hiring in the current economy. To see protests in such a scale, it shows how brave everyone is, and how bad things are.

Will things get better? Probably, but most likely not. Bureaucracy is a slow moving machine. Even if Xi Jinping himself wanted to put an end to his zero covid policy, it will still take a painfully long time for local government to actually lift the restrictions. With the fast spreading omicron variant, the potential flood of covid cases can also cause tens of millions of deaths since vaccines used in China are not very effective against the latest variants and very small portions have actually got covid in China. The government has wasted the past three years on useless lockdown when they had the chance to strengthen the health care system to prepare for a surge in covid cases. The only option is to suppress all voices with police or even military like they have done a thousand times before. What is a few angry people when facing the strength of the second largest military in the world. Still, people also thought Ukraine was going to fall in few weeks. Maybe there is hope things will change for the better.