New Delhi: China has once again reduced its number of local COVID-19 cases to zero, using the same playbook they used for previous flare-ups. The country’s health authority said on Monday that no new cases have been reported since July.
Although the delta version has raised the stakes due to the propensity of vaccines and pathogens to violate routine protocols, it is difficult to predict how long it will last.
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The last outbreak was reported on July 20, 2021, among airport cleaners in the eastern city of Nanjing. Since then 1200 people have been confirmed to be infected.
To reach even that, health officials conducted an unprecedented number of tests, even a dozen times, in one city alone, according to a Bloomberg report. Altogether they conducted nearly 100 million tests in total, in fact, some people got infected while waiting in line to get tested in Yangzhou city.
Apart from testing, they also became stricter than quarantine. At one point, the Chinese capital, Beijing, was shut down from other places even after a single case was reported. Trains and flights to and from the hotspot were halted and only 10 cases were reported during the delta flare. More than 200 neighborhoods were labeled high- or medium-risk, triggering widespread restrictions disrupting lives and businesses.
People had to isolate at home before returning to work or school, a rule that was strictly enforced.
Over the weekend, Shanghai placed hundreds of people in quarantine after cargo workers were found to have the infection at one of its two airports, raising concerns of a new outbreak in the city. Shanghai has reported no new local infections since then.
According to a Reuters report, China reported 16 new asymptomatic coronavirus cases, which it does not classify as confirmed infections unless they show signs of infection such as fever. This is down from 19 the day before. The new asymptomatic cases were all imported.
However, the approach to control at all costs is weighing heavily on the world’s second largest economy. As Bloomberg reports, consumption and manufacturing slowed in July, with further weakness expected in August, when infections peaked and measures to control them intensified. But China is determined to keep the virus at bay, Health Minister Ma Xiaowei told state news agency Xinhua on August 16, 2021, as officials plan even tougher measures aimed at more rapid virus infiltration from abroad. have to do with
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