China’s COVID-19 health code system, which strictly governs people’s movements, crashed in Xi'an this week, worsening conditions in the locked-down city where the country’s worst outbreak since Wuhan has been unfolding.
The crash has complicated efforts to weed out cases through mass testing, created hurdles for people seeking care at hospitals and led to the suspension of a top official — the latest among a slew of bureaucrats to be punished as Beijing fumes over the situation.
Liu Jun, head of Xi'an’s big-data bureau, was temporarily dismissed over performance failures, the municipal Communist Party Committee said in a statement. While the committee didn’t explicitly lay out the reason behind its decision, it came after Xi'an’s health code system — which is under Liu’s purview, and tracks individuals’ movements and vaccination status — broke down Tuesday.