In Heilongjiang, COVID-19 risk rises

The coronavirus risk in one residential community in the Nangang district of Harbin, Heilongjiang province, along with five other zones, including another residential community, three residential buildings and a community health center in Bayan county, has been elevated to medium as of Thursday, according to the city's epidemic prevention and control headquarters.

Harbin reported eight new locally transmitted confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, bringing the total to 11 since the first case in the recent outbreak was reported on Monday.

On Thursday, different testing teams arrived in Harbin from Jilin, Liaoning and Hebei provinces, local media reported. The team from Liaoning's Anshan city, which includes 52 medical workers, arrived early Thursday carrying 500,000 sets of reagents and sampling tubes.

They immediately began collecting samples in Harbin in coordination with the city's health commission.

Anshan also dispatched three mobile laboratories with a daily testing capacity of more than 100,000 samples.

"We are now facing a serious and complex COVID-19 control and prevention situation," Zhang Qingwei, Heilongjiang's Party secretary, said on Wednesday at a meeting of the provincial Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China. "The whole province has to change its regular epidemic prevention and control effort to an emergency response."

Eight patients, including four children, who were infected with novel coronavirus in Fujian province, have recovered and were discharged from Affiliated Hospital of Putian University in Putian, Fujian, on Thursday afternoon.

They are the first patients to recover in the province, as well as in Putian, which was the first city to be hit by the recent outbreak.

Fujian reported 20 local cases on Wednesday, including 17 in Xiamen and three in Putian, the provincial Health Commission said on Thursday.

From Sept 10 to Monday, Fujian reported 438 local confirmed cases, with all patients hospitalized and no deaths. Three local asymptomatic patients remain under quarantine.