BEIJING — China has ordered inhabitants of the southern city of Baise to stay home and suspended transportation links amid a surge in Covid-19 cases at least partly linked to the omicron variant, AP reported.
Classes have been suspended, non-essential businesses closed and mass testing of residents ordered. Restaurants are only permitted to serve take-out. Traffic lights have been switched to red only to remind drivers to stay home.
As of Tuesday, 135 cases had been reported in the city — at least two of them found to be omicron, health authorities said.
The city has become the latest to be placed under lockdown in keeping with China’s “zero-tolerance” approach to the pandemic. The policy requires strict measures be applied even when only a small number of cases have been found.
A major concern is preventing outbreaks during the ongoing Beijing Winter Olympic Games. No new cases were reported in the Chinese capital on Tuesday.
More than 30 athletes at the Beijing Olympics are in isolation facilities after testing positive for the coronavirus, organisers said Tuesday. The average stay in isolation is seven days.
Baise has an urban population of about 1.4 million, with another 3 million in the large surrounding rural area that abuts the Vietnamese border.
China has reported a total of 106,524 cases of Covid-19, with 4,636 deaths. Currently, 1,473 people are in treatment for the disease.
