Police in east-central China’s Henan province said Wednesday they were investigating a 60-year-old woman for allegedly assaulting a government worker after he asked her to present a Chinese coronavirus “vaccine passport” before entering a building this week.
The woman “slapped an anti-epidemic worker after she was asked to register her health code” to enter a building in the northwestern Henan city of Jiaozuo on August 16, according to China’s state-run Global Times.
A video reportedly surfaced on Chinese government-controlled social media on Monday showing the woman trying to hit the government worker with her handbag “several times” after he asked her to scan a health code via a Chinese government smartphone app before he would allow her entry to the building. The government worker “managed to dodge it [the woman’s purse] a few times, but she eventually hit him,” the Global Times detailed.
“Property management of the building said on Tuesday [August 17] that they called the police, who confirmed the case but refused to reveal further details,” the newspaper reported.
A similar incident took place also on August 16 in Beijing, when a resident of the city surnamed Li “refused to scan a health code when entering a building,” according to the Global Times. The person reportedly “insulted and pushed around” the government health worker who asked for a health code. Police in Beijing’s Dongcheng district said Wednesday they had “detained Li for causing bad social influence.”
A woman scans her health code app used for contact tracing, as she has her temperature checked by a guard while entering a shopping area on August 13, 2021 in Beijing, China. While cases still remain relatively low compared to many countries, China is containing its worst COVID-19 outbreak in months after workers in the arrivals area at Nanjing International Airport were infected with the highly contagious Delta variant and it has since spread to dozens of cities in at least 18 provinces. (Photo by Kevin Frayer/Getty Images)
China’s health code app is part of a “common process” in the country that allows government authorities to easily track Chinese coronavirus cases and close contacts, according to the Global Times. China’s ruling Communist Party (CCP) currently requires people to present a health code via a government-approved app on their personal smartphones before they are allowed entry to public spaces due to the Chinese coronavirus pandemic. The app shows an individual’s health status, including whether the person has received a Chinese coronavirus vaccination and, if so, how many doses. It also conveys Chinese coronavirus test results. Additional information, such as a person’s national I.D. number, may be registered through a code on the app. This data allows the CCP to monitor a citizen’s movement by mapping out his or her registered visits to public spaces.
The health code scanning system employed by China is often referred to informally as a “vaccine passport” and has been mandated by a number of other countries to pressure their populations into receiving Chinese coronavirus vaccinations during the ongoing pandemic. The vaccine passport system has faced a tremendous backlash worldwide for its violation of a person’s civil liberties, including individual rights to privacy and bodily integrity.
China’s vaccine passports are an extension of a pre-existing “social credit” system used by the CCP to assign citizens numerical scores based on how well or poorly they follow the party’s mandates. People risk a lower social credit score through actions as seemingly mundane as jaywalking or expressing criticism of the Chinese government online. A person’s score drops even lower if he or she commits more serious offenses or crimes. A low social credit score restricts an individual’s ability to take certain actions such as purchasing airline tickets, acquiring property, or taking out loans.
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