Shanghai is facing its worst outbreak since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

Almost all of the 25 million inhabitants have been confined since the beginning of April, with difficulties in accessing food.

Authorities are isolating people who test positive, even asymptomatic ones, by placing them in quarantine centers.

But with more than 20,000 new daily positive cases in recent days, they are struggling to keep up.

So, this Thursday, residents of the Chinese economic capital faced police officers who came to force them to give up their apartments to isolate people positive for the coronavirus there, according to several videos, a sign of growing dissatisfaction with the inflexible anti-Covid policy.

Residents accuse law enforcement of 'hitting people'

Videos released Thursday evening on Chinese social network WeChat showed residents outside a residential complex, shouting at police officers equipped with shields, dressed in full protective suits and trying to move forward through the crowd.

In the images, police officers appear to arrest several demonstrators, while residents accuse the police of "hitting people". 

The videos caused such an outcry that Zhangjiang Group, the residential complex's property developer, issued a statement about the incident.

He says the "situation is now calm" after "some tenants obstructed the construction" of a quarantine fence. 

Over 24,000 new positive cases in China

Authorities had ordered 39 households to vacate their apartments "in order to meet anti-Covid prevention needs", the group said.

In a video streamed live on WeChat and retrieved by AFP, a crying woman says, “Zhangjiang Group wants to make our residential compound a quarantine place and place coronavirus-positive people there!

The promoter claims to have offered compensation to the inhabitants and to have rehoused them in another wing of the same district.

Our file on the coronavirus

As expected, censors deleted much of the online videos of the incident.

But these were still circulating between users of social networks on Friday.

The Ministry of Health reported more than 24,000 new positive cases in China on Friday - including more than 23,000 in Shanghai.

Very high figures for the Asian country, which applies a zero Covid strategy.

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Covid-19 in China: Still confined, the inhabitants of Shanghai shout their anger at the windows

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