If China had a freer news ecosystem — in the media and on social networks — where health experts could have conducted a lively public debate about alternative strategies or residents who have been locked down for weeks could have let off steam, China might not be in the predicament it is now, with tens of millions of citizens being forced to quarantine on and off and losing trust in their government’s feel-good official propaganda.

The head of research at China’s Bank of Communications International, Hong Hao, who had three million followers on Weibo, China’s answer to Twitter, had his account suspended for making “bearish economic comments about the effects of the ongoing Shanghai lockdown, including commenting on Twitter, ‘Shanghai: zero movement, zero G.D.P.,’” The Washington Post reported from Shenzhen.

Xi and the Chinese Communist Party are reaffirming their belief that a free press in the Western sense is not a prerequisite for effectively integrating with the global economy or dominating the most advanced industries in the 21st century.