Breaking Down Wuhan's Blueprint for Lifting Lockdown

People were restricted to their compounds from Jan. 23 when Wuhan went into a lockdown that lasted 76 days. Extensive surveillance infrastructure and strict housing registration rules already in place helped to facilitate implementation of the restrictions and the easing of them later. Now, Wuhan residents live and move under the auspices of coloured QR codes embedded in WeChat and Alipay smartphone apps that use automatically collected travel and medical data. A green rating allows for unrestricted movement in and out of residential compounds and public areas, while orange and red signify a quarantine for seven and 14 days respectively.