Dozens of hearses queued outside a Beijing crematorium on Wednesday, even as China reported no new Covid-19 deaths in its growing outbreak, sparking criticism of its virus accounting as the capital braces for a surge of severe cases.<\/p>\n
Following widespread protests, the country of 1.4 billion people this month began dismantling its \u201czero-Covid\u201d regime of lockdowns and testing that had largely kept the virus away for three years \u2014 at great economic and psychological costs.<\/p>\n
The abrupt change of policy has caught the country\u2019s fragile health system unprepared, with hospitals scrambling for beds and blood, pharmacies for drugs, and authorities racing to build special clinics.<\/p>\n
Experts now predict China could face more than a million Covid deaths next year.<\/p>\n
At a crematorium in Beijing\u2019s Tongzhou district on Wednesday, a Reuters witness saw a queue of around 40 hearses waiting to enter, while the parking lot was full.<\/p>\n
Inside, family and friends \u2014 many wearing white clothing and headbands as is tradition \u2014 were gathered around roughly 20 coffins awaiting cremation. Staff wore hazmat suits. Smoke rose from five of the 15 furnaces.<\/p>\n
There was a heavy police presence outside the crematorium.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dozens of hearses queued outside a Beijing crematorium on Wednesday, even as China reported no new Covid-19 deaths in its growing outbreak, sparking criticism of its virus accounting as the capital braces for a surge of severe cases. Following widespread protests, the country of 1.4 billion people this month began dismantling its \u201czero-Covid\u201d regime of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302573,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-302567","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n