For two years, people in China have largely tolerated living under some of the world's most stringent Covid-19 controls.
Restricted borders, constant digital tracking, and the potential for mass testing and snap lockdowns whenever a handful of cases appeared were all trade-offs for a comparatively Covid-free life while the pandemic raged overseas.
But China's inability to bring its latest outbreak under control so far has prompted online rumblings from frustrated citizens, as questions about Beijing's zero-Covid strategy break into the mainstream for the first time.
In the tech hub of Shenzhen on Sunday, videos online showed residents protesting in a locked-down district, after restrictions lasted several days longer than scheduled, according to social media posts.
"You can't do this — we need to eat and pay the rent," a man in the crowd is heard yelling in anguish at health care workers, who stood behind high plastic barriers.
"Unlock! We demand lifting the lockdown!" others shouted in a second clip.
In the neighboring city of Guangzhou earlier this month, thousands of people were seen in videos trying to escape being caught in a snap lockdown at a trade fair. Some hopped fences to avoid being locked inside the venue after a single positive case was found.
Such scenes are largely unprecedented in China's more than two-year fight against the virus. And while many remain supportive of keeping Covid-19 at bay, these instances are not the only signs of changing attitudes, as millions remain under lockdown and cases climb in China's worst outbreak since early 2020.
The case against living with the virus
The toll of Covid-19 within the highly vaccinated country has been limited so far, with only two deaths reported since the beginning of the newest outbreak. Officials said earlier this month the vast majority of cases appear to be mild or asymptomatic.
Some Chinese citizens now appear to think the health measures are more onerous than the illness.
On China's popular and heavily censored social media platform Weibo, a question about why China can't relax its restrictions like other countries was the top trending hashtag on Wednesday, racking up over 500 million views.
The top post linked to an interview with the head of the National Health Commission's expert panel on Covid-19, who stressed China must "persist" in its strategy to protect the vulnerable.
The prominence of such a conversation is itself a radical departure from how questions had been dealt with in the past. Last summer, esteemed Shanghai infectious disease physician Zhang Wenhong came under a vitriolic nationalist online attack after suggesting China needed to eventually find a way to coexist with the virus.
Now, these conversations are playing out in the open as huge swaths of the country face significant restrictions to their daily lives in the latest outbreak.
At least 25 million people across four cities are under lockdown in the northern provinces of Jilin and Hebei, and an untold number of others have been subject to targeted lockdowns this month, including in the affluent first-tier cities of Shanghai and Shenzhen.
Measures take their toll
A stark example of the human toll of China's stringent measures came on Wednesday, when an off-duty nurse died of an asthma attack in Shanghai after reportedly being turned away from several hospitals, including the one where she worked.
In a statement Friday, the hospital said its emergency room was temporarily closed for Covid-19 disinfection when the nurse's family drove her there. Several outpatient and emergency departments across Shanghai have been shut due to exposure to positive cases.
Wu Jinglei, director of Shanghai's health commission, offered his condolences and vowed to reduce the disruption to normal medical services, especially for emergency rooms, while hospitals are being disinfected.
Reports of residents not being able to receive non-Covid medical treatment or having inadequate access to supplies in Shanghai circulated on social media earlier this week.
Zhang, the prominent specialist in Shanghai, said these issues had to be "addressed in the future … Otherwise, the significance of the success of the fight against Covid-19 will be largely compromised," he wrote on Weibo on Thursday.
Shanghai is facing its most serious outbreak yet, with 1,609 Covid-19 cases reported Thursday. And while authorities have denied they plan to lock down the city of 25 million people, numerous residents tell CNN a growing number of neighborhoods are being temporarily sealed off to undergo mass testing.
And even in a city with some of the best infrastructure in the country, social media complaints suggest that systems are failing to ensure residents have what they need as lockdowns are extended without notice.
"How can I buy groceries? ... I can't get medicine for my kids ... how can we order this online when we can't even get a hospital appointment?" wrote one social media user, who said their Shanghai neighborhood had been closed for 15 days.
Another complained that she was out of food staples after listening to the government's assurances that supplies were sufficient and there was no need to hoard.
"They said there was enough food ... but they didn't mention there weren't enough people to deliver it," she said.
Shanghai authorities responded on Wednesday, saying they were making "every effort" to ensure supplies.
End game
Through it all, China's health officials have been ambiguous about when zero-Covid will end.
When asked at a news conference on Tuesday, government epidemiologist Liang Wannian said China must "not waver" and stick to its plan, while waiting for a range of things to happen: outbreaks to ease overseas, the virus to mutate to become less dangerous, and better treatments and vaccines to become available.
But the answer is far from reassuring for those counting the days until they can be released from lockdown.
As one Weibo user in Shanghai wrote: "Have the people in charge really not studied this issue carefully? The price paid by people inside is endless."
