After 65 days, American leaves China's lockdown

STORY: "I am on my final leg of my journey here and I just wanted to say a quick goodbye to everyone in China. There’s a lot of really lovely people here and I hope that you guys survive this lockdown with as little pain as possible."

For the last 65 days, American Laura Hudson has been on a mission to leave China.

She quit her teaching job in China's northeastern city of Changchun on March 8 for reasons unrelated to the global health crisis.

But the city announced a lockdown three days later.

This kept Hudson confined to her apartment for most of March and April, without a functioning hot water heater.

She spent most of her time writing a book, figuring how to buy food and working out ways to get a flight out.

After Changchun lifted its lockdown, and multiple plane ticket cancellations, she flew out of Changchun on Wednesday morning (May 11) to Beijing to catch another plane that afternoon that will eventually bring her to Los Angeles.

"I don't think I will leave the United States for quite a long time after I get back, to be honest."

On Wednesday (May 11), China hit back against what it called "irresponsible" comments by the World Health Organization chief on the country's COVID policies.

“When we talk about the 'zero Covid' strategy, we don’t think that it’s sustainable."

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus' comments were not covered in China's state media and were censored on social media.

The zero-COVID policy has placed hundreds of millions of people across dozens of cities under various degrees of movement restrictions.

Most dramatically in Shanghai, which is now in its sixth week under a sweeping lockdown.

Official said on Wednesday that half the city had achieved "zero COVID" status.

But restrictions would remain in place.

In Beijing, many businesses have been closed and large numbers of people were told to work from home.

China's Palace Museum, or Forbidden City, will be shut down temporarily from May 12.