-- Beijing has upgraded its emergency response to COVID-19 from Level III to Level II, the second-highest of the four-tier system, as the city is battling to contain new clusters of COVID-19.
-- From June 11 to 16, Beijing reported 137 domestically transmitted COVID-19 cases, most of which were related to a farm produce market in the city's Fengtai District.
-- A slew of measures have been taken to curb the spread of the virus, including closed-off management of all communities and an extensive COVID-19 screening.
by Xinhua writers Ma Yujie, Li Laifang, Wang Xiaojie and Sunqi
BEIJING, June 17 -- Beijing has upgraded its emergency response to COVID-19 from Level III to Level II, the second-highest of the four-tier system, as the city is battling to contain new clusters of COVID-19.
From June 11 to 16, Beijing reported 137 domestically transmitted COVID-19 cases, most of which were related to the now-closed Xinfadi wholesale farm produce market in the city's Fengtai District. Cases related to the Beijing outbreak have also been reported in a few other provinces. The new cases emerged after the city had seen no new domestically transmitted cases for 57 consecutive days.
Members of the Beijing Blue Sky Rescue(BSR) team conduct disinfection at the Yuegezhuang wholesale market in Beijing, capital of China, June 16, 2020. (Xinhua/Chen Zhonghao)
"The epidemic situation in Beijing remains grim and the city has reported a daily double-digit increase in domestically transmitted COVID-19 cases in recent days," said Chen Bei, deputy secretary-general of the Beijing municipal government, at a press conference on Tuesday night.
A meeting of the city's Party leadership on Tuesday underlined "taking the most resolute, decisive and stringent measures, and racing against time to conduct screening, testing, epidemiological investigations and source tracing... to resolutely block the transmission route of the epidemic and control the situation quickly."
The meeting, presided over by the city's Party chief Cai Qi, also called for closely relying on citizens to jointly win the battle against COVID-19.
PARTIAL TRAVEL RESTRICTIONS
Following the upgrade of emergency response, closed-off management has been resumed in all communities in Beijing and those who seek to enter are required to go through four steps -- having their body temperature tested, showing a registered pass, having their health code checked and completing real-name registration, together with strict exit controls.
