(Bloomberg) — Covid-19 cases in the western Chinese city of Xi’an eased a bit on Wednesday after hitting a record high a day earlier, when repeat testing of its 13 million residents identified previously undetected chains of transmission.
Xi’an reported 151 infections on Wednesday, down from 175 on Tuesday, as residents have been asked to stay indoors and driving is banned. The outbreak spread from a few dozen cases in early December to roughly 150 a day after the city was locked down last Thursday, the most dramatic curb China has enacted to stymie Covid since closing off Wuhan and the broader Hubei province in January 2020.
Five rounds of mass testing have detected more than 900 infections thus far in Xi’an. The outbreak, which was initially traced to a flight from Pakistan, spread quietly throughout the community in its early days. Its ability to evade detection by contract tracers and to permeate every corner of the city is what led worried officials to enact the lockdown.
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The Xi’an outbreak shows the challenge China faces in eliminating the virus as part of the so-called Covid Zero strategy it has pursued since the start of the pandemic. The approach that features mass testing, aggressive contact tracing, quarantines and sealed borders to prevent infections from seeping in from overseas kept most of the country virus-free throughout the pandemic.
Lingering Cases
The arrival of the more contagious delta variant has challenged the status quo by proving capable of slipping through those barriers and triggering more frequent domestic flareups since May this year. The prolonged struggle against delta has raised questions about whether such a containment strategy will hold up against omicron, an even more infectious strain.
While China has detected a handful of imported omicron infections from international travelers, the variant has yet to spread domestically.
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Experts warn the latest outbreak won’t be under control until mid to late January, just days before the Winter Olympics begin in the capital Beijing.
Earlier this week Xi’an started citywide disinfection, while residents have been asked to stay home and only have one member from each household leave every other day to shop for groceries. Authorities have also suspended all domestic flights and banned private cars on the street.
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