As the lockdown continues, the handling of the Covid outbreak falls short of expectations: Shanghai official
Key Takeaways:
- On Saturday, a top Shanghai official confessed that the city's response to the raging Covid-19 outbreak had been inadequate.
- For Covid-19 therapy, Shanghai has built over 100 makeshift hospitals with over 160,000 beds and eight licensed hospitals with over 8,000 beds.
On Saturday, a top Shanghai official admitted to failings in the city's management of the rampaging Covid-19 outbreak. The city registered a new high of 23,600 new cases under a lockdown, putting the city's health care civic infrastructure under strain.
Deputy mayor Zong Ming, speaking at a press conference, said the handling of the outbreak needs to improve, albeit she complimented the work of frontline doctors and the public's support.
"We share everyone's concerns about the issues addressed and voiced," Zong said during the Saturday briefing.
"Many of our efforts have been insufficient, and there is still a significant gap between everyone's expectations." "We'll do everything we can to improve," Zong stated.
"We cannot allow the tiniest slack," Zong continued, adding that the pandemic prevention was "at the most vital point."
"We will continue to have less movement and strict control so that the pandemic can be stopped as early as possible and a dynamic societal clearing can be achieved," she said.
Medical staff, public security officers, and volunteers were congratulated and praised by Zong for their tireless efforts.
Gu Jun, the director of the city's commerce commission, acknowledged that food supplies were being distributed inefficiently and suggested that distribution centers, supermarkets, and pharmacies continue to operate online as much as feasible.
In Shanghai, a city of nearly 25 million people, a new round of Covid-19 testing was ordered on Saturday after reporting 1,015 locally transmitted symptomatic cases on Friday.
Based on the test results, the city will manage different locations according to the risk levels.
Shanghai has erected over 100 makeshift hospitals with over 160,000 beds for Covid-19 therapy and eight approved hospitals with over 8,000 beds.
Provinces and cities around the country, including Guangzhou in southern China, are preparing for breakouts.
"Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong province in south China, initiated citywide anti-Covid operations on Saturday and pledged to safeguard supplies of daily essentials in the face of Covid-19 community transmission concerns," the state-run tabloid Global Times said on Saturday.
During a news conference, Chen Bin, deputy head of Guangzhou's health commission, stated that the city is adopting all conceivable prevention and control measures, including citywide nucleic acid testing, to find infected cases as soon as possible.
As per the national health commission (NHC), the Chinese mainland recorded 1,334 new domestically transmitted confirmed Covid-19 cases on Friday, down from 1,540 on Thursday.
1,015 confirmed cases in Shanghai on Friday, 248 in Jilin, 13 in Zhejiang, and six in Beijing.
The rest was distributed across 12 provincial regions.
According to the NHC's daily bulletin, there were 23,815 new asymptomatic carriers in the Chinese mainland on Friday, with 23,737 being native and 78 being imported.