Beijing's 56-Day Clean Streak Broken by New Coronavirus Cases

Original Joey Knotts theBeijinger

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[Update: There have since been two more reported cases in Fengtai District. Scroll to the bottom for more information.]

Beijing's record of 56 consecutive days without a single new COVID-19 case was broken on Thursday following reports of at least one new local infection in Xicheng District. The news, announced at a press conference by Miao Jianhong, deputy head of Xicheng District, detailed how the patient, a 56-year-old male surnamed Tang and resident of the Yuetan Jiedao complex, was diagnosed after visiting the hospital on Wednesday with symptoms of intermittent fever, fatigue, and chills. He had no cough or chest pain.

Two of the man’s family members, including a child and fourth-grade student at Yumin Elementary School located near Line 1's Nanlishilu subway station, have been isolated for medical observation, though neither has exhibit symptoms of COVID-19 so far, according to the official Xicheng Health Weibo. Meanwhile, 33 of the student's classmates and 15 faculty members have been home quarantined and Tang has been sent for treatment at Ditan Hospital.

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During questioning, Tang reported that he had not left Beijing within the past 14 days and had no recent contact with outsiders, and there has been no official evidence or report to suggest otherwise at this time.

Liu Yuanli, the dean of Peking Union Medical College School of Public Health, told CN-Healthcare that there are two possibilities for the source of the infection: either the patient is concealing his specific whereabouts and close contacts over the past two weeks or that he contracted the disease from an existing and unaccounted for asymptomatic case.

The new case comes just five days after Beijing officially lowered its COVID-19 response to level three, significantly relaxing restrictions around the city. On Friday morning, CDC expert Zeng Guang was said to have predicted that these individual cases won't change the city's epidemic prevention level, and authorities are unlikely to adjust their current risk responses, as tweeted by the Global Times.

While it is not immediately clear whether this will be the case, the continuation of classes at Yumin Elementary suggests that officials still believe the risk of spread is low.

[Update] As of this afternoon, there have been two additional new coronavirus cases reported in Fengtai District, according to Beijing Youth Daily. Both patients are male and are colleagues at Fengtai's China Meat Research Center. The first patient, 25 years old, visited the hospital on Jun 9 complaining of a sore throat, fever, cough, runny nose, and high temperature. He stated that he had traveled into Beijing in the past two weeks after spending five days in Qingdao. The second patient, 37 years old, was taken to hospital by ambulance on Jun 12 after exhibiting a slight cough and but a normal body temperature from Jun 9 onwards. Both are now in isolation.