Number of COVID-19 cases in Xi'an rises to 1,573

Ensuring food supply for a city of 13 million people is no easy job, said Xi'an Vice-Mayor Xu Mingfei, adding that relevant departments have been ordered to make all-out efforts to ensure food, medicine and anti-pandemic materials get delivered and to maintain social order.

With the number of daily new COVID-19 cases in Xi'an still exceeding more than 100 since last week, the municipal epidemic prevention and control office announced on Sunday another round of nucleic acid testing for all residents in the Yanta and Gaoxin districts.

Residents in neighborhoods of other districts that have reported COVID-19 cases in the past seven days were also required to take nucleic acid tests.

Liu Guozhong, secretary of the Shaanxi Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China, said the most urgent tasks for Xi'an now was to conduct efficient, thorough testing and to prepare more quarantine facilities.