Eastern Qingdao, where a new coronavirus cluster had been found, aims to test about six million people from five districts by today, Chinese state media said today.
The coastal city is racing against time to carry out city-wide nucleic acid tests and roughly 9 million people will be tested in five days. So far, six confirmed patients have been reported, along with another six asymptomatic people.
A total of 3.07 million people in Qingdao had been tested by the morning today and no new patients were found, the local health authority reported, the Global Times said.
A total of 144 close contacts were tracked and quarantined with all results coming back negative. More than 170,867 people from local hospitals — patients, medical staff and nurses — and 2.9 million from communities were also tested.
Loushanhou community, where the Qingdao Chest Hospital, a designated hospital for patients from overseas, is located and where the new cluster of was discovered, was upgraded to a medium-risk area, local officials announced Monday.
Residential communities, hospitals and markets where the cases have been detected are all sealed off, the Qingdao government announced.
