China has imposed new COVID safety restrictions in response to increasing COVID-19 infections. In the past week, 11 regions altogether reported more than 100 cases.
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75% Fully VaccinatedÂ
According to NHC health officer Mi, around 75% of China’s population is completely vaccinated. This is around a billion people in the country. The spread of coronavirus infections alarmed China’s government, which has a rigorous zero-Covid policy in place to prevent infection. Authorities initially discovered the outbreak on October 16 among a group of fully vaccinated senior persons from Shanghai. This group had been on a tour of the northern areas of the region. As per Mi, 106 of the 133 cases reported as of Sunday were linked to 13 tour groups.
Infections have been detected in roughly a third of the country’s provinces and regions, with Inner Mongolia, Gansu, Ningxia, Guizhou, and Beijing being the most at-risk. Travel businesses are not allowed to organise cross-provincial tours in these areas, according to authorities.
New Restrictions Imposed
According to CNN, Beijing increased entrance restrictions on Sunday, forcing visitors from areas with confirmed cases to present a negative coronavirus test for entry. Such visitors also have to undergo 14 days of health monitoring. According to a CNN tally of the Beijing Municipal Health Commission’s daily reports, the city has registered 14 confirmed cases in the new outbreak, including 12 in the last three days.
As Beijing prepares for the 2022 Winter Olympics in February, a large COVID-19 outbreak is perhaps the last thing Chinese policy makers want to see. Six Beijing citizens have been criminally detained by Chinese officials after allegedly breaking Covid guidelines. Despite having experienced fevers after returning from a Covid-infected tourist location in Inner Mongolia, two of them went out to dine and brought friends home for mahjong. CNN claimed that two more people attempted to scale the fences of their gated community. A marathon that had been scheduled for October 31 has also been postponed by the city. It hasn’t set a new date for the event yet.
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