After Shanghai, Chinese cities fear the wave of Omicron

The variant capable of transmitting the SARS-CoV-2 virus that is spreading rapidly in Shanghai and other provinces and cities across China is BA.2 – a sub-variant cluster of Omicron.

According to Sixth Tone, this sub-variant has led to many “sad records” for the number of new cases per day in the financial center of the country. Shanghai. Specifically, the city has recorded more than 100,000 cases of infection in the past week.

BA.2 also caused a spike in the number of COVID-19 cases in the southern city of Shenzhen and Jilin province in the northeast of the country. This forced provinces and cities to quickly conduct mass testing, even blockade some areas.

Up to now, cities such as Beijing, Guangzhou and the provinces of Fujian, Zhejiang and Jiangsu have continuously reported infections caused by the BA.2 variant. Zhejiang and Jiangsu are actively introducing many restrictive measures, including stopping activities in public places.

The people of Guangzhou were afraid of going into a blockade like Shanghai, so when the city recorded 38 new cases, supermarket shelves were “sweeped”.

This southern city immediately switched students and students to online learning and closed part of the community after conducting screening tests of 18 million people to isolate.

Accordingly, Canton Fair Complex, one of the world’s largest exhibition halls in Guangzhou, has been requisitioned into a field hospital to prepare for the city’s anti-epidemic work.

Sixth Tone magazine said that the rapid spread of Omicron is “testing” the ability of the Chinese government to control the virus it is trying to contain, through mass testing and blockade. However, the central government is still determined with the plan to comply with the “zero-COVID” policy of the billion-people nation.

In Shanghai, currently the center of the COVID-19 outbreak, authorities said, the city is planning to ease some restrictions under lockdown conditions. Accordingly, if no positive cases are detected within 7 days, Shanghai residents will be allowed to go out in certain areas.

However, it is still unclear when Shanghai will be completely lifted from the city-wide “embargo”.

On April 10, 2022, this city continued to set a “record” for the number of new cases in a day with more than 25,000 positive cases, most of which were asymptomatic. The local government said that while 11,000 people have been discharged from hospital since the first positive case was recorded in March 2022, to date, 160,000 patients with mild or asymptomatic symptoms have not been able to leave the isolation area. glass.

The good news is that up to now, Shanghai has not reported any deaths due to COVID-19.