A popular video depicting the impact of Shanghai's five-week lockdown on its citizens is being blocked by Chinese internet authorities. Audio of individuals complaining about their living circumstances, lack of food, and bad medical treatment can be heard in the video.

        Attempts by the Chinese government to remove it have sparked a reaction on Chinese websites. For weeks, Shanghai's 25 million inhabitants have been confined to their homes as officials attempt to manage a catastrophic Covid-19 epidemic. Audio snippets of the local community criticizing limited food supply and talking about bad medical conditions are included in the six-minute montage.

        One individual can be heard begging, "We haven't eaten in days." "This virus will not be able to kill us. Starvation has the potential to kill "a different guy argues. The video, named The Voice of April, was extensively shared on Weibo and WeChat, two major Chinese social media sites.

        However, on Saturday, internet officials began attempting to pull it down, contending with disgruntled users who were uploading fresh versions to other sites. Shanghai residents have been instructed to stay at home for the last five weeks as part of an exceptionally stringent lockdown.

        Officials hope that the measures would help to curb the city's newest Covid-19 surge, which is the most severe wave Shanghai has ever seen. Although public criticism of government policy is uncommon in China, some Shanghai residents have expressed their dissatisfaction with their living conditions on social media platforms in recent weeks.

        Some residents in Shanghai's closed-down districts have been unable to obtain food and have been forced to wait for government deliveries of vegetables, meat, and eggs. Other newly implemented measures include installing electronic door alarms to prevent people infected from fleeing and forcefully relocating inhabitants so that their houses may be cleansed.

        All infected patients and their close connections have also been required to be transported to a government-run centralised quarantine. 

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        One lady can be heard lamenting in the viral video that "even the ceiling isn't completed yet" at the makeshift hospital where she was being checked into. "Everyone scrambled for a blanket and a bed as soon as we arrived," she claimed. "Thank you, huge whites!" exclaims another neighbor. - a moniker for health officers who wear white safety gear when enforcing lockdown regulations in Shanghai's diverse neighborhoods.

        The effort to restrict the brief video sparked a controversy on Chinese social media and a response from observers. One person reacted on Weibo, one of the most popular social media platforms: "The video just presented basic data. There's nothing to get excited about!"

        "Its content isn't groundbreaking... However, the fact that even it is suppressed disturbs me "another commenter said. Shanghai officials recorded more than 23,000 Covid-19 instances and 12 more deaths in the city on Saturday, when censors began deleting the video.

        Since the beginning of the epidemic, the Chinese government has adopted a zero-Covid approach in order to keep the country virus-free. While early lockdowns were successful in keeping infection levels low, later lockdowns have struggled to contain the more transmissible strains of the virus that have since developed.