BEIJING (AP) – A city in northern China is building a quarantine facility of 3,000 units to handle an expected overflow of patients as COVID-19 cases rise before the lunar New Year trip.
State media on Friday showed crews leveling the ground, pouring concrete and assembling prefabricated rooms in agricultural land outside Shijiazhuang, the provincial capital of Hebei province, which saw the bulk of the new business.
It is reminiscent of scenes last year, when China quickly built field hospitals and turned gyms into isolation centers to cope with the initial outbreak associated with central Wuhan city.
China has largely contained further domestic spread of the coronavirus, but the recent rise has raised concerns about the proximity to the capital Beijing and the looming rush of people planning to travel long distances to reunite with their families. to close for the most important traditional festival of the country.
The National Health Commission said Friday that 1001 patients are under the disease, 26 of whom are in a serious condition. It is said that 144 new cases have been recorded in the last 24 hours. Hebei made up 90 of the new cases, while Heilongjiang province reported further north 43.
Nine cases were brought from outside the country, while local broadcasts also took place in the southern Guangxi region and the northern province of Shaanxi, illustrating the virus’ ability to move through the vast country of 1.4 billion people, despite quarantines. , travel restrictions and electronic monitoring.
Shijiazhuang has been placed under virtual lock-in, along with the Hebei cities of Xingtai and Langfang, parts of Beijing and other cities in the northeast. It cut off travel routes, while more than 20 million people were told to stay home in the coming days.
In total, China reported 87,988 confirmed cases with 4,635 deaths.
The increase in northern China comes as experts from the World Health Organization ready to gather data on the origin of the pandemic after arriving in Wuhan on Thursday, where the coronavirus was only detected in late 2019. Team members must undergo a two-week quarantine before they can start on the field. visits.
Two of the 15 members were detained in Singapore because of their health status. One of them, a British citizen, was approved for travel on Friday after testing negative for the coronavirus, while the other, a Sudanese citizen from Qatar, tested positive again, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced.
The visit was approved by President Xi Jinping’s government after months of diplomatic struggle resulting in the unusual public complaint of the WHO chief.
That delay, coupled with the careful control of Beijing and the advancement of theories that started the pandemic elsewhere, added to the speculation that China wants to prevent discoveries that hide its self-proclaimed status as a leader in the fight against the virus.
Scientists suspect that the virus, which has killed more than 1.9 million people since the end of 2019, has jumped from bats or other animals to humans, most likely in southwest China.
Former WHO official Keiji Fukuda, who is not in the team, warned of raising expectations for any breakthroughs of the visit, saying it could take years before any firm conclusions can be drawn.
“China is going to want to come out to avoid the debt, maybe move the story. They want to appear competent and transparent,” he told The Associated Press in an interview from Hong Kong.
In turn, the WHO wants to project the image that it ‘leads, exercises, takes things in time and does’, Fukuda said.
In Wuhan, street life differed little from other Chinese cities where the virus was largely brought under control.
In a park along the river, senior citizens gathered to drink and dance while residents praised the government’s response to the crisis.
“Other countries are not very supportive and do not care about the pandemic; people go out at random, and they visit and gather, so it is especially easy for them to get infected,” said resident Xiang Nan. “I hope they can stay home and reduce the travel … let the pandemic not spread further.”
China is also continuing vaccinations using home-developed vaccines, with more than 9 million already vaccinated and planning to get 50 million by mid-next month.
___
Associated Press journalist Emily Wang contributed to this report.