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Fear of a possible Covid-19 lockdown have led some Shanghai residents to react in a manner described by some netizens as looking like a zombie movie.

Closing Time

Two videos have emerged over the weekend showing shoppers in a rush to leave a shopping mall and an IKEA store, after each location was alerted to a possible positive Covid-19 case in their premises.

The first incident occured in an IKEA in Shanghai's Xuhui district on Aug. 13.

According to Shine.cn, an English-language China-based news site, a six-year-old boy returning from Lhasa in Tibet was diagnosed with Covid-19.  A close contact of the child was notified while at the Xuhui Ikea outlet, prompting an alert.

This caused a rush for the exits by the store's customers. In a video that's widely circulated on Twitter, many shoppers could be seen trapped inside the store, as they had probably moved too late.

The video later showed a handful of customers running out before a handful of security personnel clad in basic Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) closed the door shut.

上海徐家匯宜家 一陽性後 😒
pic.twitter.com/fUbnYjAZ5h

— 雾亭 (@wutingzy) August 14, 2022

But the people behind the door were not deterred.

A large group of shoppers forced open the door and pushed through a group of security officers who were trying to hold them back. Screams and loud cries of exclamation could be heard.

The Ikea was effectively shut for two days, but has since reopened with staff undergoing five days of heightened personal health monitoring.

Struggle to escape

A second video also emerged online, allegedly taking place in a shopping mall in the Yangpu district of Shanghai.

According to the Whatsonweibo blog, the patrons of the Oriental Fisherman's Wharf mall were notified of a positive Covid case inside the mall, requiring them to be taken to a quarantine hospital for 48 hours.

But rather than staying in the mall, a number of people decided to try to make a run for it, pouring out of the one unsecured exit that was left to them.

Some people joked that a zombie apocalypse was taking place in Shanghai's Yangpu district earlier today, but it was just an alleged abnormal test result and fears of being locked in for 48hrs causing people to flee the scene as soon as they could. #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/KBVtqePWln

— Manya Koetse (@manyapan) August 12, 2022

Whatsonweibo shared the same event from two different angles. In scenes reminiscent of a zombie apocalypse movie, a throng of people pushed past PPE clad officials. One escapee was even seen dragging off a metal barricade in his hands.

But the officials managed to catch one fellow in particular, with one of them falling to the ground as they tried to wrestle him back.

Although they seemed to struggle, they managed to force him back into the building, before they and their colleagues finally managed to push the remaining crowd back into the building.

In the final frames, you can see shoppers walking away from the door, seemingly resigned to their fate.

When it rains it pours

These incidents may be emblematic of a weary Shanghai populace who endured more than two months of stringent lockdowns earlier this year as cases soared.

Adding to these woes, Reuters reports that a hacker has managed to breech Shanghai's Covid health code app, gaining the data of over 48 million users. The hacker, calling himself "XJP" has offered the data for US$4000 (SG$ 5,500).

Meanwhile, different parts of China are currently enduring their own lockdowns as part of China's ongoing zero-Covid policy.

Bloomberg reports that the Chinese resort of Sanya is currently under its own lockdown after reporting over 1,200 cases since the Aug. 1.

The irony is that many of the 80,000 holidaymakers now stranded in the vacation spot had come from Shanghai, hoping to get away from the tight Covid restrictions at home.

Top image via @modutokyo777/Twitter & @wutingzy/Twitter