Tourists were thrown into a panic after Communist leaders announced the lockdown of a Chinese holiday island during peak vacation season.

The holidaymakers were filmed raising a ruckus after officers announced that Sanya City in Hainan province would be placed under harsh quarantine restrictions on August 6, leaving some 80,000 visitors trapped in the tourist destination.

A new Covid-19 variant reportedly prompted authorities to restrict movements in China's smallest and southernmost province were cancelled.

To help the tourists, the local government reportedly handed out food and water at the station while ordering hotels to give a mandatory 50 per cent discount.

The island in the South China Sea only had two local Covid-19 cases last year which rose to 1,400 infections this month.

China's authoritarian cabal of unelected bureaucrats are continuing to follow a flawed zero-infections policy by enforcing masks, social distancing and lockdowns.

American broadcaster CNN estimated that in Beijing alone, the state's testing system is costing at least 10 million dollars a day. That doesn't include other Covid features such as its 'opaque' track and tracing apps as well as the overall cost to the economy.