The number of new Covid-19 cases in Shanghai has rebounded after a five-day decline, before dropping again on Sunday. On April 23 it was reported that a total of 23,370 new infections were recorded in the previous 24 hours, up 32.6% from a day earlier. Symptomatic cases rose 41.7% to 2,736. A total of 21,058 new cases were recorded in the last 24 hours, 10% less than a day earlier, according to data released on April 24. Symptomatic cases plunged by 49% to 1,401. Cumulative infections since the outbreak began on March 1 topped 487,000. “Controls on residential complexes should be strengthened to preserve the achievements that were made earlier,” Mayor Gong Zheng told officials during an inspection tour of central Shanghai’s Jing'an district.
The lockdown in Shanghai – now called a “standstill order”, part of “static management” measures – has been extended to April 26, after it failed to reach its “societal zero-Covid” goal by April 20, when new cases would be limited to people already in quarantine. Infections were spreading in what officials had considered low-risk areas – those that had not recorded any cases in 14 days. The total number of deaths has reached 138. Many were caused by underlying diseases, rather than Covid-19 itself.
Meanwhile, more firms are resuming production. Two suburban districts in Shanghai – Jinshan and Chongming – achieved the dynamic zero-Covid-19 goal. It means the resurgence is under control without any community transmissions. However, Shanghai even intensified certain measures to try to achieve zero community transmission in other subdistricts. In the past two years, Shanghai encountered 12 outbreaks, which it successfully quelled without resorting to lockdowns. As of last week, 70% of Shanghai's 666 key enterprises had resumed operations, Zhang Wei, Vice Mayor of Shanghai, said.
Beijing faces high risk of Covid-19 infection as the capital city has witnessed several outbreaks, involving multiple transmission chains, said a Beijing health official. Beijing reported 70 new locally transmitted cases since April 22 in eight of the city's 16 districts, further complicating prevention and control efforts. The latest infections involved students, a teacher, seniors who had been traveling in tour groups, interior decorators, a deliveryman and diners in a restaurant. A preliminary epidemiological investigation showed that the virus has been spreading for a week, said Pang Xinghuo, Deputy Director of the Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention. Some of the cases are older than 60 and had not been vaccinated.
Although Beijing has now reported 41 cases, it is uncertain whether there is a larger number of infected people, Wang Guangfa, a Beijing-based respiratory expert, told the Global Times. Beijing’s Party Secretary Cai Qi said the capital city is in a serious condition given the complicated transmission chains, and he asked to stamp out the virus as soon as possible. “The risk of further hidden transmission is high. The situation is urgent and grim,” The Beijing Daily reported. Beijing's Chaoyang district, home to some 3.5 million residents, rolled out three rounds of mass nucleic acid testing starting on April 25. Two residential communities in Chaoyang district were respectively labeled as a high-risk and medium-risk regions.
Shanghai's neighboring city of Suzhou in Jiangsu province is also battling an outbreak linked to the one in Shanghai. Jilin has controlled the coronavirus and achieved zero-Covid status at the community level in all parts of the province, and the local government is now making efforts to get production up and running again, officials said.
China is fine-tuning its Covid-19 border restrictions to shorten quarantine for incoming travelers to Shanghai, Guangzhou, Xiamen and other cities. The four-week pilot scheme – also covering Chengdu, Dalian, Ningbo, Suzhou and Qingdao – was launched on April 11 to cut quarantine from 14 to 10 days for incoming travelers and close contacts of Covid-19 patients. People in isolation will have six PCR and six rapid antigen tests in that period, which also includes seven days of health monitoring at home. The eight cities were chosen based on the number of incoming flights, the quantity of imported goods and Covid-19 control capacity. As for local outbreaks, lockdowns of quarantined areas could be lifted after 10 consecutive days without a positive test result, instead of two weeks as previously required, it said.
Hong Kong will allow foreigners to fly into the city starting next month, ending an entry ban that has kept most visitors away for more than two years. The city will also relax the threshold for suspending incoming flights carrying infected passengers from May 1. The existing three-person threshold will be raised to five, or 5% of the passengers on a single flight, whichever is greater. The length of time flight routes are suspended will be cut from seven days to five. All arrivals at Hong Kong International Airport, including residents and visitors, will be required to take a rapid antigen test (RAT), in addition to the usual polymerase chain reaction (PCR) ones. Those who test negative via RAT can take dedicated transport to undergo seven days of quarantine at designated hotels, while waiting for their PCR test result. Of all infections recorded between January and March, only 3% were imported, while the proportion fell to 1% for cases logged since April 1, when a ban on flights from nine countries including Britain and the United States ended. This past February, only 2,600 people arrived in the city for the purposes of travel, far lower than the five million visitors recorded in the same month in 2019 before the pandemic hit.
Researchers from Wuhan University’s Medical Research Institute said they have developed a new coronavirus test that can return accurate results in less than 20 minutes and that is as sensitive as the lab-based PCR test. The method used is named sPAMC, which is based on the classic CRISPR technology. Their findings were published in Nature Biomedical Engineering, a peer-reviewed journal, in late March. However, clinical trials will take several months before the wide deployment of the tests. The PCR tests that are widely used must be processed in a lab and have a turnaround time of about six hours. Since mid-March, the country has also adopted rapid antigen tests that can be administered at home but are less accurate.
This overview is based on reports by the China Daily, Shanghai Daily, Global Times and South China Morning Post.
