Shanghai expands lockdown as cases jump by a third

It reports record 5,656 asymptomatic cases and 326 symptomatic cases for Tuesday

SHANGHAI • The Chinese authorities began locking down some western areas of Shanghai yesterday, two days ahead of schedule, as new Covid-19 cases in China’s most populous city jumped by a third despite stringent curbs already in place to try to stop the coronavirus spreading.

Home to 26 million people, China’s financial hub is in its third day of a lockdown that officials are imposing by dividing the city roughly along the Huangpu River, splitting the historic centre west of the river from the eastern financial and industrial district of Pudong to allow for staggered mass tests.

While residents in the east have been locked down since Monday, those in the west were originally scheduled to start their four-day lockdown tomorrow. Several residents living in western districts on Tuesday received notice from their housing committees that they would be stopped from leaving their compounds for the next seven days.

Locking down a major metropolis like Shanghai full-scale would result in a 4 per cent reduction in the national real gross domestic product, economists at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Tsinghua University and other institutes estimated in mid-March.