Chinese officials plan to test 16 million residents living in western Shanghai in the coming days, after the city began the second phase of its lockdown on April 1, according to China’s state-run media. Meanwhile, residents living in eastern and southern Shanghai hoping to return to normal life on April 1 after a four-day lockdown have been told that they could be confined to their homes a lot longer, a fresh sign that the city’s COVID-19 outbreak is not easing. China has been battling the spread of the Omicron variant of the CCP virus for about a month, with Shanghai being one of the hardest-hit areas. The city reported 4,502 new infection cases on April 1, though the actual number could be significantly higher, since experts and some Chinese residents have previously said that Chinese officials were underreporting infection numbers. The spike in infection cases prompted Shanghai officials to begin …