Millions of people were tested for COVID-19 in several major cities in China on Sunday, as the country tries to stem a spike in coronavirus cases not seen in months.
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China reported 75 new infections on Sunday.
The epidemic that appeared in Nanjing Airport (East) at the end of July has spread to more than twenty cities and more than ten provinces.
China is facing its worst wave of pollution in several months, and authorities have blamed the increase in cases on the delta variable.
While the coronavirus was first detected in Wuhan at the end of 2019, China has since been able to largely control the epidemic.
Authorities organized three large-scale screenings among the 9.2 million residents of Nanjing and confined hundreds of thousands of people to curb pollution.
The current spread of the virus is linked to the severe infection of the delta variant and the peak of the tourist season in the country, which leads to the extensive use of air transport by the Chinese, according to the authorities.
Those who traveled to Nanjing, the tourist town of Zhangjiajie in Hunan Province, are wanted by the authorities.
This tourist city’s 1.5 million residents were restricted on Friday.
According to health officials, the mini-epidemic recorded in Zhangjiajie was caused by travelers from Nanjing and helped spread the disease to more than 20 cities.
“Zhangjiajie has now become a new starting point for the epidemic in China,” virologist Zhong Nanshan told reporters on Saturday.
“We need to expand the search for connection states of a delta variant.”
On Sunday, Beijing reported three local cases of infection: A family living on the outskirts of the capital was returning from Zhangjiajie, the Beijing Health Bureau said.
The capital has cut off all rail, road and air links with areas where coronavirus cases have been identified.
Beijing also closed its doors to tourists and only allowed “essential travelers” who had tested negative.
The authorities said that new cases of infection were recorded on Sunday on Hainan Island, another popular tourist destination, as well as in the provinces of Ningxia (north) and Shandong (east).
The country is also grappling with a sharp rise in cases in Zhengzhou, Henan Province – which was recently hit by deadly floods – after two maintenance workers at a hospital with foreign patients tested positive for COVID-19.
In this city, 27 local cases were recorded, and the authorities ordered Sunday that its 10 million residents be examined.
After learning that some patients had been vaccinated, Chinese health officials said it was “normal,” and stressed the importance of vaccination and strict measures.
“Because of the delta variant, the protection of the vaccine may be somewhat reduced, but the current vaccine still has a good protective and protective effect against the delta variant,” said Feng Zijian, a virologist at the Chinese Center for Control and Prevention.
The world’s most populous country gave 1.65 billion doses on Saturday (only”Made in China»), but without specifying the number of fully vaccinated populations.
