On April 1, 2021, access to several neighborhoods in Ruili was restricted.
The outbreak of New Coronavirus (CCP virus) has rebounded in some parts of mainland China. Four new indigenous confirmed and four asymptomatic cases of infection were added, all from Ruili, a border city with Myanmar, and some of the patients are of Burmese origin. The epidemic, coupled with the tense situation in Myanmar, is expected to make it more difficult to prevent and control the epidemic as a large number of smugglers may cross the border for refuge in the near future.
Under the impact of the new wave of the epidemic, the city of Ruili in Yunnan Province has been closed since Tuesday (30). All residents in the city are to be quarantined at home, and mandatory testing will begin on Wednesday. In the next few days, 300,000 city residents will be vaccinated against the new crown.
Mr. Lee, a local resident, has been staying at home since Thursday. He criticized the government for delaying the notification of the outbreak and missing the best time to prevent and control it.
Mr. Li: “From yesterday (Thursday) at noon and afternoon immediately strict up. Basically, no one is allowed to go out, no one is allowed to move in the streets. I received the news on the 28th, originally thought there were one or two cases, the authorities will be able to control and strong prevention, but I did not expect it to be so serious. When testing nucleic acid this number is going to go up again, because the cases smuggled over, they do not know when they came in.”
Ruili city government said the confirmed case found in the routine nucleic acid testing is a Burmese national, the patient has arrived in Ruili early last year, after a number of confirmed Burmese nationals are long-term residents in Ruili, the preliminary judgment is a native case, but still can not find the source.
Chinese CDC experts said Ruili is located on the border between China and Myanmar, and Myanmar is one of the hardest hit areas of the epidemic in Southeast Asia, it is estimated that the virus is highly likely to be imported from outside the country. Li, a resident, said that the border is currently guarded mainly by local people, and with a borderline of more than 170 kilometers, it is very difficult to keep the gate.
April 1, 2021, the streets in Ruili are thinly populated. (Exclusive courtesy of Mr. Li)
Mr. Li: “Normally, you don’t see public security, it’s all militia groups or militias made up of ordinary people. There will be people (smugglers) cut barbed wire, there will be people digging, barbed wire is on the flat ground, he went to dig a hole to drill directly over. The people here basically do not go abroad, it is the people over there (Myanmar) to come, some are China’s past and then back, and there is Myanmar’s smuggling to China. Every day there are smugglers running inland from here.”
The protests in Myanmar have so far claimed more than 500 lives. Earlier, someone even photographed the Chinese Communist Liberation Army gathering in Ruili city, and outsiders estimate that a civil war may break out in Myanmar.
Mr. Huang, a resident of Yunnan, believes that if the Burmese military government intensifies its crackdown, many Burmese or Burmese Chinese are expected to cross the border for refuge.
The city of Ruili, which borders Myanmar, has several border gates on April 1, 2021. (Exclusive courtesy of Mr. Li)
Mr. Huang: “(China’s) border with Myanmar is also very long, not only from Ruili, from other places can also run over well. There is no such thing as too strict a blockade. If a humanitarian disaster occurs, everyone must run for their lives.”
Ruili city was closed last September after two smugglers from Myanmar entered the city, causing the spread of the epidemic.
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