British journalist Thomas Hale is the Shanghai correspondent for Financial Times, and he recently published a rare account of what life is like inside one of China's COVID-19 quarantine camps, where he was restricted for 10 days, not because he tested positive for COVID, but because he was tracked through his cell phone as being close to someone else who tested positive for COVID.

The title of the article is I spent 10 days in a secret Chinese Covid detention centre.

The call came from a number I did not recognise.

"You need to quarantine," a man on the other end of the line said in Mandarin. He was calling from the Shanghai Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention. "I'll come and get you in about four or five hours."

I dashed out of my hotel to stock up on crucial supplies. Based on advice from colleagues and my previous experience of quarantine in China, these included: tinned tuna, tea, biscuits, three types of vitamin, four varieties of Haribo sweets, Tupperware, a yoga mat, a towel, cleaning equipment, an extension cable, a large number of books, eye drops, a tray, a mug and a coaster with a painting of the countryside surrounding Bolton Abbey in North Yorkshire.

Four to five hours later, I received another phone call. This time it was a woman from the hotel's staff. "You are a close contact," she said. "You can't go outside."

"Am I the only close contact in the hotel?"

I was, she told me and added "the hotel is closed", meaning locked down. I went to the door of my room and opened it. A member of staff was standing there. We both jumped.