Prominent Chinese commentator Hu Xijin said on Sunday that as China ponders its COVID-19 policies, epidemic experts need to speak out and China ought to conduct comprehensive research and make any studies transparent to the public. Hu's unusual call on Chinese social media for candour and transparency earned him 34,000 likes on the popular Twitter-like microblog Weibo, as well as frank responses from netizens in a normally tightly-policed internet quick to censor voices deemed a risk to social stability. China's top leaders warned in May amid the COVID lockdown of Shanghai and widespread restrictions in the Chinese capital Beijing that...