5 Cities Report New Contagious COVID Variant

8 Minutes Read

• Tianjin is the fifth Chinese city to report the virus variant initially detected in the UK. The other Chinese cities are Shanghai, Guangzhou, Qingdao, and Beijing.

• On January 23, 2021, according to National Health Commission, there are 3 locally transmitted COVID-19 cases reported in Beijing on January 22; while another 3 newly confirmed cases were reported in Shanghai.

• Experts have called for stronger prevention and control measures to curb the spread of the more transmissible variant in the country.

Photo:Yang Hui/ Global Times

 Shanghai Reports 8 Imported and 3 Domestic Cases 

Shanghai reports more suspected local COVID-19 cases, the first resurgence since November. On Friday, the city reported three new domestic cases, bringing the total number of infections in the latest local outbreak to nine local confirmed cases. Eight imported cases were reported on Friday, one of whom is a pilot of a cargo plane who flew from the US to Shanghai's Pudong International Airport on Thursday. 

Some 73 close contacts of the eight imported cases and 75 close contacts of the three local cases have been quarantined and the venues they visited have been disinfected, the local health commission said in its information release on Saturday morning.

 Beijing: Unpredictable But No Need to Panic 

Earlier on January 20, 2021, per Beijing CDC, based on the whole genome sequencing and analysis, the clustering epidemic in Daxing District is highly homologous with the novel coronavirus variant found in the UK, whose infectivity has increased by 40% to 70%. Here are four specific details of this round of outbreak.

Beijing eyes antibody tests on overseas arrivals to the capital from 40 days ago to trace source  

Beijing will conduct serum antibody tests for all inbound overseas travelers who have entered Beijing since December 10 to find out the transmission chain in the latest cluster infections in the capital's Daxing district, the Beijing government said on Friday. The measure was announced when four districts in the Chinese capital covering at least 4 million residents either started or finished district wide nucleic acid testing. 

Beijing will strictly implement the new "14+7+7" model -- 14-day centralized medical quarantine, one week of home isolation or centralized quarantine, and another week of health monitoring -- for all inbound travelers from overseas

 High & Medium-Risk Areas in China 

Data as of 23rd January.

If you've visited any of the areas below, or your office/ living address is registered in one of those areas, you might risk being quarantined when you visit another city or region.

Currently there are  in China. The high-risk areas are located in Hebei (Shijiazhuang/ Xingtai), Heilongjiang (Suihua), Beijing (Daxing) and Jilin (Tonghua). The middle-risk areas are located in Beijing (Shunyi), Liaoning (Dalian), Heilongjiang (Qiqi Haier/ Harbin/ Daqing), Hebei (Shijiazhuang, Xingtai & Langfang), Jilin (Changchun/ Gongzhuling/ Tonghua/ Songyuan) and Shanghai (Huangpu).

Click on the images to enlarge

If you've visited any of the areas mentioned above, please socially distance and get a test immediately. If you have symptoms, please visit the hospital for a COVID-19 test.

Note that if you are or return from a low risk area of a city listed above, be prepared to be treated as from a medium risk area.

Source: CDC疾控人, Global Times, China Daily.

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We are monitoring the situation closely, and will inform you as soon as we have more information. 

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