A haunting look back on the ground zero of the COVID-19 pandemic.

On April 8, 2020, after 76 days, the Wuhan lockdown finally lifted.

To commemorate the significance of that date and the events leading up to it, the Boston Review of Books shared access to the world-changing story of the “Wuhan Lockdown,” a documentary that chronicles the trauma of Wuhan residents during the city’s lockdown using smuggled citizen footage and frontline reporting.

Conceived by former 1989 student leader Wang Dan and produced by a large team of volunteers—including exiled citizen journalist Lu Yuyu—who developed their own anti-censorship tools to compile material, the film highlights whistleblowers, as well as now-imprisoned or exiled citizen reporters. Despite its goal of preserving the memory of the human tragedy and official cover-up, Wuhan residents must risk using illegal circumvention software to view the documentary. [For more background, see: “Wuhan Residents Can’t View Documentary About COVID-19 Lockdown Trauma”].

The Boston Review of Books also includes updates for the interviewees who appeared in “Wuhan Lockdown,” which premiered globally on December 30, 2023, with screenings in various democratic countries.

“Wuhan Lockdown” can be viewed in full via the link below [1:52:15]:
https://archive.org/details/20260122_20260122_0851?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email