A bus that crashed early Sunday morning in southwest China, killing 27 people and injuring 20 others, was an official government vehicle carrying people quarantined for COVID-19, local authorities confirmed. The quarantine bus overturned on a freeway around 2:40 am. between Guiyang – the capital of Guizhou province – and nearby Libo County. After a preliminary investigation, officials said the accident was likely caused by driver fatigue. Speaking at a press conference late Sunday, Lin Gang, vice mayor of Guiyang, bowed deeply and said his government “sincerely apologizes to the entire society” for the horrific loss of life. He promised a thorough investigation into the cause of the accident and officials would “take seriously the legal responsibilities of the parties involved,” according to state media. As news of the crash spread on Sunday, it sparked outrage online, with many seeing it as an example of the dangers of China’s draconian COVID-19 policies. While Guizhou has seen a sharp rise in coronavirus cases in recent days, with 712 reported on Saturday, the highest in the country, it has recorded only two deaths since the pandemic began. On social media, locals said those on the bus had been ordered to a quarantine location after a single case was reported in their building. A woman, whose mother was among those killed on Sunday, blamed COVID policies for her death. Wu Geng said she talked to her on Saturday night and her mother had just come back negative. “I’m devastated. I never knew that the call last night would be the last time I spoke to her,” Ms. Wu wrote on Weibo. “She hadn’t left the house for several days except to get tested for COVID, and then she was quarantined for no reason and she died from it, it’s an ending I can’t accept.” The crash was among Sunday’s top trending topics on Weibo, with many commenting that “we’re all on this bus” and asking when the country’s increasingly hated COVID-19 policies will finally be relaxed. Comments and shares were later disabled on several hashtags related to the incident, and popular posts were deleted. It is unclear whether Sunday’s deaths will be counted as COVID-related deaths, with some darkly speculating that if they were, it could be used as justification for tighter control measures, given the more than 1,200 percent increase in deaths. represent. Authorities across China are under intense pressure to control local cases ahead of the five-year Communist Party congress that begins on October 16, when President Xi Jinping is expected to secure a historic third term as leader. The surge in infections in Guizhou accounted for about 70 percent of new cases nationwide on Saturday, and authorities there had said they would have to transfer those in quarantine “to sister cities and states” because of limited capacity in Guiyang. Influential commentator Hu Xijin, a former editor of the state-run Global Times newspaper, wrote on Weibo that “we can imagine how worried the local authorities are right now and how much pressure they are under.” With files from Alexandra Li and Reuters
