Faced in recent weeks with an epidemic rebound linked to the Delta strain, China did not report any new cases of Covid-19 of local origin on its soil on Monday, which is a first for a month and leaves to think that the spread is contained.
The Asian country, which had largely controlled the Covid epidemic since the spring of 2020, has been facing a resurgence of contamination on its soil since July, despite some of the most stringent health measures in the world.
About twenty imported cases
The outbreak, initially detected at the airport in Nanjing (east), has spread to nearly half of the country’s provinces, made more than a thousand sick and resulted in the confinement of several million inhabitants. This is the largest epidemic rebound in China in terms of geographic extent, since the appearance of the first cases of Covid in the country at the end of 2019.
The capital Beijing and the city of Wuhan (center), which at the start of the epidemic was the first in the world to impose a strict quarantine on its 11 million inhabitants, were notably affected. China did not report any new local contamination on its soil on Monday, the first since July 16. However, the country has recorded 21 new so-called “imported” cases, that is to say people returning from abroad and infected.
Zero tolerance
China follows a policy of zero tolerance towards the virus and hastens to contain new outbreaks, at a time when the Delta variant, more contagious, is raging in particular in neighboring Burma. The country uses containments, generalized screening and mobile applications to track movements. China also imposes mandatory quarantines on arrival on the territory and keeps its borders closed to the vast majority of foreign nationals.
In terms of vaccination, the most populous country in the world has already administered 1.94 billion doses (only “made in China”), according to the latest official figures released on Saturday. The number of fully vaccinated inhabitants, however, is not known.