China update: Xian hospital tragedy and Olympic countdown among our reporter’s picks of the week’s headlines

Two pregnant women lose babies and man dies after heart attack, all having been reportedly refused entry to hospitals because of Covid-19 protocols

Beijing’s air quality improves and its Winter Olympics is only a month away, while another Hong Kong media outlet, Citizen News, announces its closure

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Xian Gaoxin Hospital staff were punished after refusing entry to a heavily pregnant woman who lost her baby. Photo: Weibo

Published: 8:30am, 7 Jan 2022Updated: 10:55am, 7 Jan 2022

Good morning and welcome to 2022!

I’m Echo Xie, a China desk reporter focusing on climate, energy and environment. You can reach me on Twitter @EchoooXie.

This week, a lot of Chinese people have been concerned about Covid-19 in Xian, the northwestern city that has locked down its 13 million residents for the past two weeks. The chaos revived memories of Wuhan when it was the original pandemic epicentre in early 2020.

There have been complaints of food shortages, a crashing health code app and now heartbreaking stories emerging of people being refused urgent treatment because of rigid enforcement of Covid-19 protocols.

This week also marked one month until the Winter Olympics, to be hosted by Beijing and the neighbouring city of Zhangjiakou.

Covid-19

Xian’s handling of its outbreak has been in the spotlight – even more so after two pregnant women lost their babies because hospitals turned them away, according to accounts on Weibo. One showed a Covid-19 test result that had expired four hours earlier, and the other lived in a compound the rules forbade her to leave.

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