SHANGHAI (Reuters). Despite stringent controls in place, authorities began to secure some areas in Shanghai’s west two days early.

China’s financial center is home to 26 million residents. Officials have imposed a third-day lockdown on the city along the Huangpu River. This divides the historical centre west of Pudong from the eastern financial district and industrial area of Pudong.

Residents in the east are currently locked down, but those living in the west have their lockdown scheduled for Friday.

Locking down a major metropolis like Shanghai full-scale would result in a 4% reduction in the national real gross domestic product, economists at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Tsinghua University and other institutes estimated https://michaelzsong.weebly.com/uploads/4/8/1/4/48141215/truck_flow_and_covid19_220315.pdf in mid-March.

Shanghai had a record of 5,656 COVID cases on Wednesday and 326 cases with symptoms. It was an increase of 4,381 new asymptomatic patients and 96 additional cases with symptoms in the previous day. China will reclassify asymptomatic patients if they develop symptoms later.

Residents in west districts received notification from their housing committees Tuesday that they were to be prevented from moving out of their properties for the following seven days.

One notice from a housing committee that Reuters saw stated, “We will soon resume our normal lives, but we ask everyone in the meantime to observe closely pandemic control and do not gather. And reduce movements.”

Minhang in the city’s southwest, which is home to over 2.5 million residents, announced that it will suspend all public bus service until April 5.

At a Wednesday press conference, Shanghai officials stated that they have conducted 9.1 Million nucleic acids tests since Monday’s lockdown.

In a month-long operation, they said that they would begin to disinfect offices, markets, and schools.

GRAPHIC: 2022 COVID-19 cases in Shanghai, https://graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS/CHINA-SHANGHAI/znvneqlerpl/chart.png ‘PUDONG PANDEMIC’

The disruption of business life was already severe.

As two of the major suppliers for components, Aptiv (NYSE) and Thyssenkrupp(DE:), joined Tesla (NASDAQ;) in closing plants in response to COVID measures, this lockdown has disrupted auto production.

Chinese companies have stopped a wave domestic first public offerings. This is due to the fact that filings reveal, the case surge has hampered due diligence, information gathering, and is expected to affect an estimated $9 billion in fundraising.

On Tuesday night, the Shanghai government announced on WeChat that anyone refusing to submit to nucleic acid testing would be held legally responsible. The government also stated that they would take action against price gouging. This was after many people had stockpiled food and medicine in preparation for the lockdowns.

The daily number of local infections has risen to a record high in mainland China in the last two weeks, surpassing those in the first two-months of this year. This is the largest case wave since 2020’s Wuhan one.

Three-day lockdown was imposed by Xuzhou (an eastern Chinese city) in all areas, effective Wednesday.

According to the Xuzhou government, each household should send only one person out every two days to buy necessities. Non-essential businesses should shut down, allow employees to work remotely, or be operated in a closed loop fashion.