SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang region in the far west of China, went into “war mode” and launched an emergency response plan after the city reported 16 new cases of coronavirus on Friday .
FILE PHOTO: People wear protective face masks while walking in a shopping complex after an outbreak of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Beijing, China, July 17, 2020. REUTERS / Thomas Peter
The state television network CCTV quoted unidentified officials who said at a press conference Saturday that the city had suspended the meetings and ordered the communities to restrict visits to other homes.
He urged people not to make unnecessary trips out of the city and ordered infection tests for anyone who needed to leave Urumqi, in order to prevent the spread of the virus. It has also carried out free infection tests throughout the city, officials said at the press conference as part of what officials called a “wartime” response.
In its official Weibo account on Saturday, the regional government said that all recent new infections and asymptomatic cases reported in the autonomous region were in Urumqi.
Rui Baoling, director of the center for disease control and prevention in Urumqi, said at the press conference that recent cases in the city were associated with a group of activities, with all confirmed cases and asymptomatic infections reported in the district of Tianshan CCTV said. She did not say what activities were involved.
“The epidemic has developed rapidly,” Rui said.
Home to the majority of China’s Uighur ethnic minority, Xinjiang has so far largely avoided the worst of the coronavirus pandemic that erupted in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year.
As of July 17, the region reported a total of 17 coronavirus cases, plus 11 asymptomatic cases. Another 269 people were under medical observation, according to the regional health commission.
He reported 12 other asymptomatic cases as of noon Saturday.
SOURCE OF INFECTION
The city released an emergency response plan on Friday to analyze confirmed cases and asymptomatic infections, state broadcaster CCTV reported, adding that the government will carry out epidemiological investigations to trace the source of the infection and make sure no one is lose.
“The epidemic situation is generally controllable,” Rui told state media.
Outbreak control measures in the city have led to the cancellation of more than 600 scheduled flights at Urumqi Diwopu International Airport, or more than 80% of the usual daily total, figures from aviation data firm Variflight showed.
Urumqi also suspended metro services from Thursday night.
Including the 16 cases in Urumqi, China reported 22 new cases of coronavirus on the mainland by July 17, up from 10 the previous day, the health authority said on Saturday. Another six were imported cases.
China reported 14 new asymptomatic patients, up from five the previous day.
China’s capital Beijing suffered an outbreak of coronavirus infections last month, in response to which the government re-imposed strict control measures that were used across the country earlier this year to quell the first wave of infections. . The measures appear to have controlled the outbreak.
As of Friday, mainland China had 83,644 confirmed cases of coronavirus, the health authority said. The COVID-19 death toll remained at 4,634.
Reports by Winni Zhou, William Zhang and Brenda Goh; Edition by Lincoln Feast and David Holmes
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