TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Taking a jab at China's zero-COVID policy, this illustration of the Chinese moon goddess Chang'e (嫦娥) getting swabbed for COVID was posted on social media on Monday (Sept. 12).

Saturday (Sept. 10), was the Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival, which is held on the 15th day of the 8th month of the lunisolar calendar, which is marked by a full moon. In Chinese mythology, a woman named Chang'e stole the elixir of immortality in order to maintain her youth and beauty and took refuge on the moon, where she stays to this day.

In recent months, China has gone to extraordinary lengths to maintain its "zero-COVID" policy, locking down massive cities such as Chengdu, Dalian, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Tianjin, submitting tens of millions to quarantines and mass testing.

So extreme are these measures, that videos of "Big Whites," workers in hazmat suits, have emerged showing them swabbing a wide variety of animals and inanimate objects which are highly unlikely to transmit COVID such as fish, geese, pigs, clothes, vegetables, and rocks.

On Monday, Twitter user Northrup Gundam uploaded this illustration mocking China's Quixotic quest by timing it with the Moon Festival. In the illustration, even Chang'e and her ultimate quarantine is not enough for China's Big Whites. Even the moon goddess must submit to an oral swabbing for a PCR test.

(Twitter, Northrup Gundam image)