Strict action taken as Dalian cases spread to 9 cities

With the COVID-19 outbreak in Dalian having spilled over to nine cities across the country, including Beijing, the city in Liaoning province has strengthened epidemic control efforts to quell the escalating outbreak.

Beijing reported one new local case related to Dalian on Tuesday. The patient, a 53-year-old woman from Anhui province, arrived in the capital to visit her daughter in Changping district. She had become infected after a dinner with an asymptomatic carrier from Dalian on July 16 in Jinzhou, Liaoning province.

Eight other cities in four provinces-including Tieling, Liaoning; Changchun, Jilin; Hegang, Heilongjiang; and Fuzhou, Fujian-had reported confirmed or asymptomatic cases transmitted from Dalian as of Tuesday, officials said.

On Monday, Dalian, with one high-risk subdistrict and four medium-risk residential communities, identified six new COVID-19 infections. That elevated the city's total confirmed cases to 44 since a new outbreak was discovered on July 22, the city health commission said.

To help contain the virus, Dalian has expanded its screening and quarantine programs, introduced social distancing orders and strictly curtailed those allowed to leave the city. Nearly 3 million of its 7 million residents had been tested as of Tuesday morning.

Indoor entertainment venues were indefinitely shut down on Tuesday, a city government statement said.

Residents of high-risk and medium-risk areas cannot leave the city, and local officials pledged to share information on close contacts of local patients with other parts of the country.

In Beijing on Tuesday night, Changping district announced the raising of the public health emergency response from the third to the second level in Western Tiantongyuan Third Area, the residential community where the female patient had been, according to the Beijing Evening News. The community was designated a medium-risk area and up to 600 residents in the community had been tested by Tuesday.

Xu Hejian, a spokesman for Beijing's municipal government, called the new cases alarming and said authorities will strictly follow epidemic control and prevention measures including medical observation of people from high-risk and medium-risk areas. He also suggested residents avoid business trips to high-and medium-risk areas.

In Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, another epidemic hot spot, newly confirmed cases continued to grow. The city reported 57 locally transmitted infections on Monday, raising total infections to almost 400 since the July 15 outbreak. In addition, there were 11 asymptomatic cases.

The first recovered patients since the outbreak-six who had confirmed infections or were asymptomatic carriers-were discharged from hospitals on Tuesday, said Shang Yulan, deputy secretary-general of the city government. The city vowed to tighten measures including supervision of officials fighting the virus.