Ground zero of novel Coronavirus and the reason for the pandemic situation of the world, Wuhan, will receive a lift-off from the lockdown on April 8 as announced by the Chinese government.
The city has shown tremendous fight back against the deadly outbreak being the epicenter of the pandemic.
The date was announced after more than 2 months since the city was cut off from the rest of the world, as a measure to contain the rapidly spreading virus. Other cities of Hubei province will also be relieved from the lockdown as said by the authorities.
The lockdown in Wuhan helped in taking down new cases of the novel coronavirus dropping to zero for 5 consecutive days from thousands of daily new cases appearing since the first outbreak. Hubei province had the most cases of coronavirus till Monday in China with around 67,801 confirmed cases and 3,160 deaths.
With a population of around 11 million people, Wuhan was locked down on January 23, with all passages to enter and exit the city closed, public transport including flights, buses, trains canceled and highways closed as well.
Later, more cities of Hubei province followed the lockdown to safeguard the 60 million residents in the province and to fight against the coronavirus outbreak. Three months after the outbreak, the president of China Xi Jinping visited Wuhan on March 10.
The restrictions and lockdown in Wuhan helped in slowing down the spread of the virus, but they failed to contain it. In the past week, there has been close to zero new local cases reported in China, with the focus shifting instead to stopping Covid-19 cases from being imported from overseas. The toll of confirmed cases passed 440,000 with more than 19,000 deaths globally as of now, according to the coronavirus statistics taken from World Health Organizations and Additional sources.
Easing restrictions from lockdown in Wuhan
Starting from Wednesday, residents of Hubei province expect for Wuhan will be able to leave the province if they have a green QR code on their phones, said by Hubei provincial government in a notice on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like platform.
Hubei previously announced a system for its residents which tells about the health status of an individual, for which the person has to obtain the color-based QR-code which comes in red, yellow and green color indicating the health of the individual.
People who have been a confirmed case of coronavirus, suspected or asymptomatic cases or even with a fever received a red color QR code. All their close contacts received a yellow code and people without any record in the database got a green code, meaning they are healthy and safe to travel. The QR code system for health status is still in practice.
On April 8, the easing of restrictions will be extended to Wuhan, where the coronavirus first emerged in December, and residents with a green QR code will be able to leave the city and the province.
Moreover, people from other parts of China will be allowed to enter Hubei and Wuhan if they can produce a green QR code, with no additional paperwork required, the notice said. Businesses in Wuhan will also gradually resume operations, based on risk assessment, while the reopening dates for schools and universities remain to be determined, according to the notice.
Along with entering and exiting out the Wuhan, residents will also be able to go back to their work, if they carry a green QR code and a letter from their employer, and will only require to undergo temperature check when they return home. All checkpoints in the city will be removed and public transportation will be resumed back again as reported by the Wuhan Government.
