China’s largest metropolis reported first COVID-19 deaths since lockdown

Shanghai said Monday that three individuals have died from COVID-19, the first official death toll from an epidemic that has paralyzed the megacity for weeks, eliciting widespread outrage and rare demonstrations.

Since March, a patchwork of restrictions has restricted the majority of the city’s 25 million citizens to their homes or complexes, with daily caseloads often exceeding 25,000.

On Monday, local officials announced the first fatalities — all of whom were old and had pre-existing ailments.

They “deteriorated into serious cases upon admission to the hospital and died after all attempts to resuscitate them failed,” the city stated on its official social media account.

According to the statement, two of the deceased were ladies in their eighties and nineties, while the third was a 91-year-old male.

The fatalities were confirmed by the city health commission.

According to the city health authority, the eastern commercial hub reported 22,248 new domestic cases on Monday.

While the data are modest in comparison to previous global outbreaks, they continue a trend that has seen the city report tens of thousands of daily cases, the most of which are asymptomatic.

As a result, officials have reaffirmed Beijing’s long-standing zero-tolerance policy against the virus, promising to maintain onerous travel restrictions and isolation of everyone who tests positive – even if they exhibit no symptoms of disease.

Shanghai residents – one of China’s richest and most cosmopolitan cities — have complained about food shortages, austere quarantine conditions, and heavy-handed policing.

Social media users lambasted authorities for the videotaped murder of a pet corgi by a health worker and a now-softened policy of isolating diseased youngsters from their virus-free parents.

Videos uploaded online last week showed locals scuffling with hazmat-suited police asking them to relinquish their houses to patients, providing a rare peek into the unhappiness.

Other film and audio snippets reflect growing desperation, with some showing individuals busting past barricades in a desperate attempt to obtain food.

Despite the backlash, China, where the coronavirus was first identified in late 2019, has maintained its tried-and-true zero-COVID policy of mass testing, travel restrictions, and targeted lockdowns.

However, the world’s most populous country has recently failed to suppress outbreaks in a number of locations, mostly due to the rapidly spreading omicron form.

On March 19, the nation announced two additional COVID-19 deaths — the first in more than a year — in the northeastern rust belt province of Jilin.