Precautions heightened against latest COVID-19 subvariants

High-risk port workers to be placed under strict closed-loop management

Chinese authorities have required heightened precautions against COVID-19 risks brought by imports and inbound travelers amid a global resurgence caused by two highly transmissible Omicron subvariants.

Lei Zhenglong, deputy director of the National Health Commission's Bureau of Disease Prevention and Control, said that the BA.4 and BA.5 strains have become dominant in South Korea, Portugal, the United Kingdom and Israel, and led to rising infections in other European countries and the United States.

"In recent days, Beijing, Tianjin and Shaanxi province also reported domestic BA.5 infection clusters triggered by imported cases," he said at a news conference. "As the pressure on fending off the virus' spread from overseas is growing, we've ordered local governments to ramp up relevant disease control work."

He said that high-risk port workers will be put under strict closed-loop management, and monitoring and disinfection of cold-chain products and vehicles arriving from overseas will be strengthened.

As China has recently shortened the centralized quarantine times for inbound travelers from 14 to 7 days as part of an upgrade of its national COVID-19 control guidelines, Lei stressed that the change does not signal a loosening of policy, and implementation of the new rules should be more rigorous.

"Some regions were found to have reduced the frequency of nucleic acid tests for incoming passengers undergoing centralized isolation, conducted final tests before releasing them in advance or fail to examine cross-infection risks at quarantine facilities after reporting positive cases," he said.

"These issues have increased the risk of the local spread of the virus, and local governments should intensify management of centralized isolation sites," Lei added.

To improve the precision of virus control measures at ports, Li Zhengliang, an official with the General Administration of Customs, said the administration also released a new version of the virus control guideline to ensure the safety of travelers while reducing disruptions to international transport and trade.

For instance, cargo planes deemed at low risk of transmitting the virus and that will not come into frequent contact with domestic workers, will have some inspections waived, and repetitive disinfection of cold-chain products will be canceled to enhance cross-border trade, said Li.

He added that despite climbing infection numbers overseas, the positivity rate of cold chain imports had dropped significantly in recent days.

According to the National Health Commission, the domestic epidemic situation had been trending downward last month, but experienced an uptick this month.

From July 1 to Thursday, daily local infections were around 325, with Anhui and Jiangsu provinces in East China registering the most cases. On Thursday, the mainland reported 47 confirmed local infections and 331 asymptomatic cases.

Cheng Youquan, deputy director of the commission's Bureau of Inspection and Supervision, said that from June 28 to Wednesday the commission had received nearly 14,000 complaints from the public regarding experiencing excessive COVID-19 restrictions imposed by local governments.

Nearly 84 percent of these cases had been successfully resolved, he added.