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SHANGHAI / BEIJING (Reuters) – The Chinese city of Qingdao said on Monday that it will screen its entire population of more than 9 million people for the coronavirus, after discovering 12 new infections that appeared to be related to a hospital treating imported infections. .
Daily COVID-19 infections in mainland China have dropped dramatically since the beginning of the outbreak, which first emerged in the city of Wuhan. China has reported no new cases of domestic transmission since early August, but has remained on high alert.
Qingdao on Sunday reported a total of six new COVID-19 cases and six asymptomatic infections, all related to the Qingdao Chest Hospital, where infected travelers arriving from abroad have been treated in an isolated area.
The specific source of infection was still under investigation, the city government said on Sunday.
The tests would cover the city in five days, the city said.
The new cases were all from current or former patients at Qingdao Chest Hospital, hospital staff, or members of their family. One asymptomatic case was that of a taxi driver whose wife worked in the hospital and was also infected.
Qingdao said it closed the Qingdao chest hospital, as well as the emergency department of its central hospital, which the taxi driver visited. Buildings housing infected people have also been blocked as part of the city’s virus containment measures.
The new infections emerged shortly after China completed its Golden Week holiday, during which millions of people traveled nationally.
Disease control authorities in several cities, including Beijing, advised residents to avoid unnecessary travel to Qingdao. An investment and trade expo in Qingdao organized by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and scheduled for the weekend of October 16-18 has been postponed, state television reported.
Qingdao’s mass testing campaign is not China’s first. Wuhan tested its entire population, and massive schemes involving several million samples have also been carried out in Beijing and Urumqi.
The daily count by the National Health Commission reported 21 confirmed cases of COVID-19, but none were included in Qingdao. The number of new asymptomatic cases nationwide, which China counts separately from confirmed cases, rose to 32 from 23 the day before, the NHC said. It did not provide a breakdown of where the new asymptomatic cases were reported, although it said 29 were imported.
The total confirmed COVID-19 cases in mainland China now stands at 85,578. The death toll remains at 4,634.
(Reporting by Winni Zhou, Jing Wang, and Engen Tham in Shanghai and Roxanne Liu in Beijing; written by Se Young Lee; edited by Christian Schmollinger, Michael Perry, and Tom Hogue)
