Spreading Coronavirus Forces Lockdown of More Chinese Cities - The Wall Street Journal

China has locked down some cities, including Wuhan, to try to contain a fast-spreading virus. WSJ’s Shan Li took one of the last trains out of the outbreak epicenter as millions adjusted travel plans for the Lunar New Year holiday.

Stephanie Yang

The Wall Street Journal

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@stephanieayang
stephanie.yang@wsj.com

Updated Jan. 23, 2020 6:02 am ET

BEIJING—Two more Chinese cities were put on lockdown by government authorities, expanding an unprecedented experiment to try to contain a fast-spreading virus that has killed at least 17 people and infected more than 500.

On Thursday, authorities in Huanggang—a city of 7.5 million people—said they won’t let long-distance trains and buses run from the urban center and will shut its public transportation system in the lockdown zone, effective midnight Friday local time. Ezhou, another neighboring city with just over a million residents, said it would enact similar restrictions.

Spreading quickly from its epicenter in the city of Wuhan, a potentially lethal virus has sickened hundreds around China and reached the U.S., Japan and South Korea. Countries are rushing to contain the outbreak. Photo: Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Huanggang is about 35 miles east of Wuhan, a city of 11 million and a major hub for travel, where the new pneumonia-causing coronavirus originated. Wuhan just hours earlier halted outbound trains and flights and shut down its public-transportation system.

The Huanggang local government also said movie theaters, internet cafes and other entertainment and cultural facilities in the city center would temporarily halt operations and a central market would be shut down for an indefinite period.

Starting Thursday, the local government said it would inspect every person and car entering and exiting the urban center.

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The new restrictions and shutdowns effectively represent a doubling down by Chinese authorities of a high-stakes strategy that experts describe as an untested approach to dealing with infectious diseases.

“To my knowledge, trying to contain a city of 11 million people is new to science. It has not been tried before as a public health measure, so we cannot at this stage say it will or will not work,” Gauden Galea, the World Health Organization’s country representative for China, said in an interview Thursday with the Associated Press, referring to the Wuhan lockdown.

Mr. Galea added that while such a radical measure “obviously has social and economic impacts that are considerable,” it also “demonstrates a very strong public health commitment and a willingness to take dramatic action.”