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. 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 to 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. State media reported customs clearance at the crossing points of Longbang and Pingming were delayed, causing further disruptions to cross-border trade that have already inflicted major losses on Vietnamese fruit farmers who rely on the Chinese market for much of their revenue.
