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The 52-year-old man bought meat and fish at a wholesale market in southern Beijing, and eight days later, on June 11, he was already hot, shivering, and soon tested positive for coronavirus.
This is the first case of COVID-19 in the Chinese capital in 55 days, shattering hopes that long months of physical isolation, scrupulous testing and quarantine have eradicated the pathogen in a city of more than 20 million people.
About 300 cases of COVID-19 have been detected in Beijing, schools have closed, and thousands of domestic flights have been canceled. The renewed outbreak sends a rhythm alert to countries that appear to have broken the virus’s circuits.
Coronavirus’s ability to cause mild or no symptoms in a significant number of people allows the infection to spread silently for weeks, even months. This results in virus reservoirs that can remain hidden until someone feels so bad that testing is necessary.
“The spread of the virus may have started a month ago, when many asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic patients had already managed to spread the infection to the environment,” said George Gao of the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention, at a meeting of government advisers in Shanghai last week. Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The virus likely lurked in a dark, humid environment while circulating among humans, he said.
The focus on China’s political center also reveals how difficult it is to get rid of a treacherous infection without an effective vaccine.
“Not removed”
Some countries and cities that appear to have controlled the virus are increasingly re-registering cases. Victoria, Australia’s second most populous state, tightened controls on Monday after a spike in infections. To avoid further outbreaks, New Zealand last week appointed an army chief to oversee the quarantine of citizens returning from abroad. In June, the country withdrew its physical distance requirements, with no active cases of COVID-19 recorded for some time, indicating that the goal of eradicating the virus had been achieved.
Other countries, from South Korea to Germany, are dealing with new fireplaces in an attempt to extinguish the sparks before they catch fire.
“We cannot say that it is ‘eliminated’ everywhere,” said Peter Collignon, a Canadian professor of clinical medicine at the National University of Australia School of Medicine, who advises the Australian government on infection control.
The silence of the new cases may indicate that the spread has only been minimized, Collignon said.
However, the virus can continue to infect people, albeit with minimal symptoms, and “then it can flare up and spread as long as it has a favorable chance,” he said.
Peking health authorities are believed to have identified only the “tip of the iceberg” when they diagnosed COVID-19, a 52-year-old market visitor, in June, “said Raina MacIntyre, world professor of biosecurity at the University of New Wales. South in Sydney.
“The outbreak itself likely started a few weeks before it was detected,” he said.
More cases were found between wholesalers and wholesale market buyers after the infection was registered. Health officials detected the virus and took environmental samples, including an imported salmon cutting board.
The breakdown of the genetic sequence showed that this unique virus was similar to the one that had spread in Europe, and immediately sparked speculation that the virus may have entered the country through imported salmon.
According to China’s CDC chief epidemiologist Wu Zunyou, such findings “say little” because the kitchen utensil may have been contaminated with drops exhaled by an infected worker or shopper.
“In my opinion, the environment in meat packing plants could have been contaminated if someone infected had been there, and the virus could remain in that environment for some time,” said Benjamin Cowling, head of the School of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the University of Hong Kong “But there is no evidence that this has led to further spread.”
Where the spread of the coronavirus has been studied, it appears to have been most commonly transmitted directly from person to person, Cowling said.
Family case group
Beijing last identified a new case (until June) in mid-April, when a student returning from the United States became ill after completing fourteen days of quarantine. He then passed the virus on to his mother, brother, and grandfather, but the virus did not spread outside the family.
Following reports of infection on June 11, six more cases were detected the next day, and dozens of cases were detected per day the following week. Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan warned of the risks of further spread, especially given the outbreak’s link to a crowded wholesale market.
Beijing appears to have carried out rapid tests to identify, treat and quarantine people infected with the virus and trace their contacts.
According to Wu Zunyou, chief epidemiologist at China’s CDC, the outbreak in Beijing is under control, with new cases showing a delay in human infection and a positive test result.
And yet, new cases continue to rise, Wu Zunyou said. “By saying” controlled, “I am not saying that there will be no cases tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. This curve will continue for some time as the number of infections gradually decreases.”
Alternative approach
With unstable growth in new cases and uncertainty about when COVID-19 will eventually be eradicated, Beijing is refraining from large-scale quarantine in the city, as it was introduced in Wuhan, where a pandemic began in late 2019.
Instead, officials decided to restrict population movement at identified hot spots, to halt the spread of the virus and minimize disruption to economic activity in the Chinese capital.
“China has a very clear strategy: reduce the number of COVID-19 cases to zero and keep it at zero as long as possible,” said Cowling of the University of Hong Kong. – But to get to zero, the measures can be too drastic and have a direct impact on human health in the long term due to its economic consequences.
Meanwhile, the rest of the world is looking to see if Beijing, with an alternative approach, will be able to quell the outbreak without further damaging the economy. This is another difficult confrontation with a pandemic that has been brought to the attention of world governments without previous experience.
“The situation is unprecedented,” said MacIntyre. “Most of the people living today have never experienced anything like this.”
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