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Covid-19 in China: Beijing tightens restrictions as May Day holidays begin
Shanghai also reported 47 Covid-19 deaths for Friday, down from 52 a day earlier, pushing the death toll to 385 in the ongoing outbreak. The overall death toll on the mainland stands at 5,022.
BEIJING: Shanghai detected no new daily Covid-19 case outside quarantine areas for April 29, a first in weeks, health authorities said on Saturday even as Beijing tightened restrictions across the city on the first day of the five-day Labour Day holidays.
Beijing has ordered shut all schools, public places including entertainment venues and gyms and theatres until May 4 as it attempts to stop residents from gathering or going out during the holidays.
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The five-day break is usually one of China’s busiest travel periods but the country’s worst Covid-19 resurgence since the pandemic in early 2020 is more than likely to keep people home.
Even after the holidays are over, the local government in Beijing has said residents must provide nucleic-acid test results within seven days before going to public places or taking public transport.
Starting May 5, a negative Covid test taken within the past week will be needed to enter “all kinds of public areas and to take public transport”, according to a notice on the city’s official WeChat page.
A nucleic acid test result taken within 48 hours is also required to stay in hotels and BNBs.
Officials, neither in Beijing nor in paralysed Shanghai, have provided a timeline for returning to some semblance of normality.
Beijing reported 48 daily symptomatic Covid-19 cases, compared with 47 the day before, Xinhua news agency said on Saturday.
The city also recorded six asymptomatic cases, versus two a day earlier, it said.
The caseload in Beijing now stands at 282.
China reported over 10,700 domestic Covid cases on Saturday, including asymptomatic ones, with most cases in the economic hub of Shanghai; of the 1,410 locally transmitted symptomatic Covid-19 cases, 1,249 were in Shanghai, the national health commission’s (NHC) reported on Saturday.
“Confirmed symptomatic cases in Shanghai stood at 1,249, down from 5,487 the previous day,” a Shanghai official said on Saturday, adding that all the asymptomatic and confirmed cases were found in quarantined areas.
The rest of the cases in China were reported in 14 other provincial-level regions, including Beijing, Guangdong and Sichuan.
Shanghai also reported 47 Covid-19 deaths for Friday, down from 52 a day earlier, pushing the death toll to 385 in the ongoing outbreak. The overall death toll on the mainland stands at 5,022.
Meanwhile, the Shanghai municipal government has approved a second batch of companies to resume production as most parts of the city still remained under lockdown amid omicron flare-ups.
“Companies in semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, petrochemicals, mechanics and logistics make up a large portion of the city’s second list of businesses to restart operations,” the Caixin news website reported.
