‘I am angry’: residents locked down in mainland China blame Hong Kong for sending over Covid-19 infections while taking in much-needed aid

Numerous posts widely circulating on Chinese social media platforms Weibo and WeChat contrasted the way authorities in the two cities were handling the outbreaks, with sarcastic comments pointing to Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s reluctance to apologise and replicate a mainland-style swift shutdown to curb the spread of infections.

Pro-Beijing heavyweights and academics in Hong Kong said they fully understood the growing anti-Hong Kong sentiment as the local government had not tried its best to avoid cross-border transmissions, while some suggested the comments showed the central government was also disappointed in officials.

“The central government’s disappointment is quite obvious,” said Executive Councillor Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, who also chairs the pro-establishment People’s New Party. “The central government has spent all their efforts to help us, and now [our mainland counterparts] are shutting down and having a hard time while Hong Kong seems to be ‘lying down’ and doing not enough to cut transmissions, allowing deaths and cases to go up. We seem to be irresponsible.”

On Tuesday, Hong Kong logged more than 27,700 Covid-19 infections and 289 deaths, while Shenzhen reported 60 cases on the first day of its citywide one-week shutdown, complemented by three rounds of compulsory testing for its 17 million residents.

Dongguan, a city of 10 million in Guangdong, was also placed in a lockdown after reporting 55 cases on Monday.

One WeChat post shared by thousands of users offered a photo essay titled “Shenzhen is under lockdown. How about Hong Kong?” that contrasted the quiet street scenes and closed subway stations in the mainland city with crowded beaches and shopping malls in Hong Kong taken by local media last weekend.