China’s harsh and elitist covid rules

IN TIMES OF disease, revolution or famine, Beijing’s city gates offered China’s imperial rulers more than mere security. These hulking towers of grey brick and stone were symbols of a system that strove to keep death itself far from the seat of supreme power. When smallpox swept the arid plains and mountains of north-east China, the sick were quarantined miles outside Beijing and even imperial family members banished, if they lacked immunity from a previous infection. During some bubonic plagues, burials were banned in Beijing and detailed records kept of each coffin exiting its gates. In the heyday of China’s final, revolution-haunted dynasty, the Qing, the city maintained a garrison of 33,000 paramilitary police—or about one guard for every 20 Beijingers—with orders to track and register every stranger who entered its walls, whether domestic or foreign. When famines stalked the countryside, a gruel of millet and rice was served at temples just outside the city gates, to keep refugees from storming Beijing.