Table of Contents
What’s happening?
- The Chinese authorities reported 2,300 new virus cases nationwide on Monday, news agency Reuters reported.
- A day earlier, China witnessed a single-day spike of over 3,400 Covid-19 cases, the highest daily figure in two years.
- After two years of virtually closed borders, mass testing, targeted lockdowns and quarantines, the restrictions are being scaled as cases surge across the country.
- China’s caseload since the start of the pandemic, just over 115,000, is a fraction of those recorded elsewhere.
- The official death toll has stayed under 5,000.
Lockdowns kick in
- Seventeen million people in the Chinese tech hub of Shenzhen began their first full day under lockdown Monday,
- As the southern city battled an Omicron flare-up in factories and neighbourhoods linked to nearby Hong Kong, which is recording scores of daily deaths as the virus runs rampant, reports said.
- China’s largest city, Shanghai, also remained sealed off on Monday with several residential areas and offices shut as city authorities try to avoid a full lockdown.
- The city reported around 170 new virus cases on Monday.
- China’s Dongguan city in Guangdong province suspended the operation of buses and the subway network from Monday.
- At least five cities in the province have been locked down since the beginning of March, including the major industrial base of Changchun, whose nine million residents were confined at home
Mass testing begins
- China on Friday said it would for the first time allow the general public to use Covid-19 antigen self-test kits that do not need medical workers to take samples.
- The country’s Health Commission also announced its plan of scaling up Covid-19 testing manifold.
Zero covid policy?
- Earlier this month, a top Chinese official claimed that China had
- been one of the best performers in curbing the Covid pandemic and attributed the success to its stringent zero-case policy of restricting national and international travel with proactive local lockdowns wherever the virus surfaced.
- However, with several cities including Shanghai and Beijing now witnessing a surge in cases, the country’s Covid control strategy has come under question.
- China’s strict zero-covid approach is here to stay as authorities are trying to avoid the implementation of mass city-wide lockdowns, news agency AFP reported.
- Top medical expert Zhang Wenhong said Monday that China cannot relax its zero-Covid policy just yet despite the low fatality rate of Omicron.
- “It is very important for China to continue to adopt the strategy of community Covid-zero in the near future,”
Hong Kong?
- Meanwhile, the situation continues to deteriorate in Hong Kong where officials confirmed 27,647 new Covid-19 cases.
- The former British colony also reported 87 Covid-related deaths taking the overall toll to 3,729, the report said.
- The ability to add more flights on international routes could potentially bring some relief to airfares on some of these routes that had shot up as only a limited number were being allowed to operate.
- Airlines operated 4,700 international flights every week from India prior to the Covid-19 suspension.
- The COVID-19 vaccine to be administered to the 12-14 years age group would be Corbevax manufactured by Biological E. Limited, Hyderabad, the Union health ministry said.
- In the phase 3 trials starting now, the vaccine will be studied as a booster dose in those who have received two doses of Covaxin or Covishield vaccines and also in those who are yet to be vaccinated.
- The gap between booster dose and full vaccination will be six months and in all, nearly 5,000 participants are expected to volunteer for the trials.
- Virologists say that intranasal immunisation can create an immune response in the nose, which is the point of entry for the virus—thereby protecting against disease, infection and transmission.
Q) In which among the following diseases, Seed Therapy is used now a days for treatment?
- Cancer
- AIDS
- Tuberculosis
- Asthama
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