China continues easing 'zero-COVID' restrictions

China continued easing stringent policies to limit coronavirus infections on Monday, with commuters in Beijing and at least 16 other cities allowed onto buses and subways without a COVID-19 test within 48 hours for the first time in months. Industrial centers, including Guangzhou near Hong Kong, have lifted most of their rules under China's "zero-COVID" strategy, allowing markets and businesses to reopen, but kept the restrictions in place in neighborhoods with high infection rates. Beijing has allowed cities to dial back local restrictions, without linking the changes to anti-lockdown protests or signaling when the national "zero-COVID" strategy, which has confined millions of people to their homes, might end.