Wuhan plans to test all of its 11m residents

WUHAN plans to conduct coronavirus tests on its entire population after six new cases were reported over the weekend, local authorities said.

Officials have been ordered to submit plans to administer nucleic acid tests on all residents in the city of 11 million people, according to an official notice. “Each district should make plans and arrangements to conduct nucleic acid tests on the entire population in its jurisdiction within a 10-day time limit,” the notice said, although it was unclear when testing would begin.

The plan was announced after Wuhan, capital city of the central Hubei Province, reported the first cluster of new COVID-19 infections since the city reopened after a 76-day lockdown on April 8.

Six new cases were reported on Saturday and Sunday from a residential compound in Dongxihu District.

Older and densely populated residential compounds and those with a concentration of migrant populations should be the focus of the testing, the document also showed.

China’s mainland reported no new domestic coronavirus infections on Monday, after two consecutive days of double-digit increases. China has largely brought the virus under control, but virus clusters have appeared.

Chinese health authorities yesterday called for vigilance to be maintained against the novel coronavirus. In the past two weeks, new cases have been reported in seven provinces.

The reappearance of clusters suggested that counter-epidemic measures could not be relaxed, Mi Feng, spokesman at the National Health Commission, said yesterday.

While prevention and control efforts had normalized, that did not mean measures could be eased, Mi said.

As of Monday, China’s mainland had 115 current confirmed cases, while 5,470 people were under medical observation for signs of novel coronavirus infection.

(Agencies)