On Saturday, for the first time since January 2021, cases of death from COVID-19 have been reported in China and two people have died. In view of the increase in corona virus cases, officials refused to relax the policy of banning foreign travel. The country has seen a sharp spike in COVID-19 cases in recent weeks after two years, raising questions about China’s claim that it has made best efforts to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. At the same time, the city of Hong Kong is going through its worst phase of the epidemic.
China’s National Health Commission said on Saturday that two people died due to corona virus. These are the first cases of death from COVID-19 after January 2021. A total of 4,638 people have died in the country so far since the virus originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan in 2019. There has been a tremendous increase in the cases of infection in the country due to the highly contagious Omicron form of the corona virus.
Xiao Yahui, an official of the National Health Commission, said on Saturday that the two people who died were elderly patients and were also suffering from other diseases. He said that one of them was not vaccinated against COVID-19. On Saturday, 2,157 new cases of infection were reported in China, which are linked to community spread of infection. Most of these cases came from Jilin province. Travel restrictions have been imposed in Jilin province to prevent the spread of infection, and people are required to seek police permission to travel.
More than 29,000 cases of infection have been confirmed across China since the beginning of March. A successful ‘zero-Covid’ strategy since the start of the pandemic outbreak in Wuhan in China in 2019 has led to lockdowns and mass screening of millions of people. So far 4,636 people have died. These figures were updated once in April 2020.
The strategy has found widespread support and has prevented a higher number of infections than in other countries, many of which have begun easing COVID restrictions. However, President Xi Jinping on Thursday for the first time acknowledged the burden of COVID-19 prevention measures, saying China should seek “maximum impact” with “minimum cost” in controlling the virus. .
Hong Kong, which is facing its worst phase of the pandemic, reported 16,583 new cases on Saturday. Cases of infection in Hong Kong exceeded one million on Friday and the death toll has already exceeded that of China. China’s COVID-19 figures are counted separately from the Special Administrative Region, Hong Kong.