After two months, China lifted lockdown in Shanghai yesterday, looking to do the same next week in Hubei region. Apart from protective masks, quite common even before Covid19, what has changed?
Citizens may be allowed to go out, paying attention not to gather in crowded places and obeying strict rules. At the entrance of any shop or restaurant, body temperature is tested and personal health code must be shown, to prove nobody is infected or comes from infected areas.
How does this health code work?
It is a smartphone app, keeping track of our home, our movements and people we meet. It is usually green but, when we meet anybody infected, or someone living near us is tested as infected, our code will turn red and we shall be forced to stay home in quarantine.
What kind of travels are possible?
China has suspended entry visas, forcing international arrivals to 14 days quarantine. We can easily assume that in the future traveling for other reasons besides work won’t be easy, maybe even impossible outside Europe.
Today is our tomorrow, when our daily routine is based on a green light on our smartphone. We shall be even more connected, with the world under our fingers, but we won’t be allowed to see it with our own eyes. We have to sacrifice our freedom, privacy and social life in the name of economical and physical preservation of our species.
Adaptability to this new life will condition the development and well-being of the West in the coming years, and China is already 10 years ahead of us.
