HUNDREDS of retirees have taken to the streets of the Chinese cities of Wuhan and Dalian to protest against cuts to medical benefits, following rare demonstrations in November that led to the end of China’s controversial “zero-COVID” policy.
In the central city of Wuhan, videos posted online on Wednesday showed hundreds of mainly elderly people outside the city’s central Zhongshan Park.
One video from Wuhan, home to about 11 million people, that was verified by the Reuters news agency, showed protesters and uniformed security guards pushing and shoving each other.
In the northeastern city of Dalian, hundreds also took to the streets to protest the health insurance reforms, the AFP news agency said, citing a local witness.
“Give me back my medical insurance money,” they could be heard chanting in one video, which AFP geolocated to the city’s Renmin Square, where a number of local government buildings are situated.
Protests are rare in China but public anger does sometimes erupt, including widespread protests last year against the strict anti-pandemic measures that had been in force for nearly three years under the zero-COVID policy of President Xi Jinping.
The demonstrations come weeks ahead of China’s annual parliamentary gathering in early March.
In Wuhan, the city where COVID-19 was first detected in late 2019, police lined up in multiple rows, some locking arms, while hundreds of mostly elderly protesters spilt onto the main road, shouting complaints. In one video, the crowd began singing “The Internationale”, the communist anthem taught and sung in China since the Communist Party took power at the end of the civil war in 1949.
