The outbreak of Covid-19 in Nanjing, Jiangsu province, has spread to Beijing and 18 other provinces and dozens of cities. It is the most extensive domestic outbreak after Wuhan in December 2019. The first confirmed case of the latest outbreak was detected on July 20 at Nanjing Lukou International Airport. Airline passengers brought the virus across the country to places including Sichuan and Liaoning provinces. 31 provincial-level regions across China warned residents against unnecessary travel. Residential areas – where more than 10,000 residents live – around the Guoxing community in Beijing's Haidian district have been locked down with public places in the area being closed. The capital city has reported several local confirmed cases associated with infected people returning from outside. Wuhan, capital of Hubei province, also reported seven local cases, the first since June 2020.
At least 19 people who attended a show in Zhangjiajie, a tourist spot in Hunan province, or who have close contacts with those who attended the show, tested positive for the virus. Some of them made a stop-over in Nanjing. Two of them were from Beijing. About 2,000 people attended the show on July 22. Fifty-three new locally transmitted confirmed cases and 25 asymptomatic carriers were reported on the Chinese mainland on July 31. In Zhengzhou, capital of Henan province, the Directors of the city’s Health Commission and the No 6 People’s Hospital were sacked for failing to contain the virus. The city on July 31 reported 12 locally transmitted confirmed Covid-19 cases and 20 asymptomatic cases. Most of the locally transmitted cases in Henan are related to the No 6 People’s Hospital, which is the designated hospital for treating imported Covid-19 patients in Zhengzhou. The city of more than 12.6 million set up 4,168 sample collection sites to complete citywide nucleic acid testing in three days.
China reported 328 confirmed domestic infections in July, roughly equivalent to the total number of local cases from February to June. The Chinese mainland on August 1 reported 55 new locally transmitted cases. Of those, 40 were reported in Jiangsu, seven in Hunan, two each in Beijing and Hubei, and one each in Shandong, Henan, Hainan and Yunnan.
Local authorities in Nanjing said that the delta variant was detected in the latest Covid-19 outbreak in the city. The total number of cases in the recent outbreak in the city reached 215, including eight patients in serious condition. A flight from Russia, which was suspended several times by the Chinese aviation regulator for carrying Covid-19 patients, was identified as the source of the latest outbreak at Nanjing International Airport, the Nanjing health authority said. Airport cleaning staff were infected while cleaning the airplane's cabin. The virus that infected the cleaners was the same as the one imported cases on flight CA910 were infected with. The flight arrived in Nanjing on July 10 from Russia. Flight CA910 has been suspended at least 10 times due to “circuit breaker” measures for inbound flights, which stipulated a flight be suspended for a week if five or more passengers tested positive, or longer if more infected passengers were identified.
All flights from Nanjing Lukou International Airport have been suspended until August 11, and the possibility of a further suspension has not been ruled out. All of the Nanjing's Lukou subdistrict, which has a population of more than 80,000 people, has been declared a high-risk area. Many people, who have had two doses of the vaccine were still infected with the delta variant in the recent Covid-19 outbreak in Nanjing. Bao Changjun, Director of the Acute Infectious Disease Control Institute of the CDC in Jiangsu province, said the transmission capacity of the delta variant is significantly enhanced – double that of past strains and 40% more contagious than the alpha variant discovered in the United Kingdom.
The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has ordered that the aviation sector’s key front-line staff be tested every two days. CAAC Director Feng Zhenglin said workers who have direct contact with international passengers and cargo will be kept separate from those who work with domestic passengers and cargo, and neither group is allowed to have contact with their family members or other outsiders during work hours. In Nanjing, cleaning was outsourced to a third party, which had a negative impact on epidemic prevention. According to the Global Times, experts pointed out that the Nanjing outbreak showed how some Chinese cities have become slack at anti-epidemic work, and this should be a wake-up call for all these cities.
Sinovac released the initial results of a Phase II clinical trial on booster shots of China-developed inactivated Covid-19 vaccines. The study, conducted in Jiangsu province since May 2020, found that although antibody levels declined six months after two Sinovac shots, a two-dose vaccination schedule generates good immune memory. A third dose, given at an interval of six to eight months after the second dose, led to a strong boost in immune response. The study also found that giving a third dose too early (28 days after the second dose) induced a much lower antibody level – only one-third compared with a third dose given six or more months after a second dose. Optimizing the timing of a booster dose should take into account immunogenicity, vaccine efficacy/effectiveness, the local epidemic situation, infection risk, and vaccine supply, according to the study. Provisions for booster shots in China would be highly probable, given the Sinovac clinical trial results, Zhuang Shilihe, a Guangzhou-based expert, told the Global Times. Zhuang said that it is necessary for people who plan to attend the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics in February 2022 to receive booster shots as many of them may have had their two vaccine shots more than six months before, while crowds would increase infection risks.
The COVAX vaccine facility is set to begin deliveries in the developing world in August of the Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine, after the United Nations announced a deal for 200 million doses. The UN Children’s Fund UNICEF said Sinovac will supply 50 million doses through September, and 150 million doses over the rest of this year. Both parties agreed to an option for a further 180 million doses in the first half of 2022, taking the total number of doses available under the deal to 380 million. CoronaVac only became eligible for distribution under COVAX when it gained approval for emergency use from the World Health Organization (WHO) in June.
A two-dose inhaled Covid-19 vaccine developed by Chinese researchers appears to be safe and capable of eliciting strong immune responses comparable to those of more conventional one-dose vaccines. Cansino Biologics, which created the vaccine with the Academy of Military Medical Sciences’ Beijing Institute of Biotechnology, said it is the first company in the world to publish clinical data on an aerosol Covid-19 vaccine. Results from its early stage human trial are promising and support further research into what promises to be an effective and economical candidate. The company’s injectable Covid-19 vaccine gained conditional approval from the top drug regulator in late February, and the new version is identical in terms of composition, packaging and manufacturing process, except that it is delivered through inhalation and contains a lower dosage – about one-fifth that of the injection. The study’s results were published in The Lancet Infectious Disease journal.
China’s mass immunization program is progressing smoothly, with over 1.65 billion doses administered as of July 31, according to the National Health Commission (NHC). The program had covered 150 million people 60 years and older and 12.48 million youths between 12 to 17. The total number of confirmed Covid-19 cases on the mainland reached 93,005 by July 31, including 1,022 patients still receiving treatment, 25 of whom were in severe condition. The death toll stands at 4,636.
This overview is based on reports by the China Daily, Global Times, Shanghai Daily and South China Morning Post.
