China Cancels Hundreds of Flights, Closes Schools due to Corona Infections in Shanghai

On Friday, China canceled hundreds of flights, closed some schools, and suspended tourist activities, after discovering infections with the Coronavirus (known also as COVID-19), in Shanghai, which puts pressure on this host country for the Winter Olympics, according to “Bloomberg”.

A few months before the start of the Olympics in Beijing on February 4, China wants to reduce at all costs the risks of pollution and adopt a health policy aimed at preventing any infection.

This is reflected in the adoption of strict restrictions on entering its lands, the imposition of a mandatory quarantine, and a wide campaign of examinations, as soon as a small number of infections appear.

China’s COVID strategy has been to identify and interrupt community transmission through swift containment measures, sometimes for whole cities. And, despite already vaccinating over 75% of the population, it seems to be sticking to this approach, according to the "mbj" news website.

Maintenance of containment has greatly reduced the impact of COVID-19 lives lost and socioeconomic progress, wrote researchers including George Gao, head of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in Nature Medicine in April.1

When people test positive for covid-19 in China they have to isolate, and authorities must implement targeted movement restrictions and PCR testing in geographical areas, working quickly to trace contacts who may have been exposed so that they too can be isolated. Authorities that don’t act quickly enough and people who don’t comply with COVID-19 regulations face punishment.

COVID-19 measures led to the closure of Shanghai Disneyland, and testing was required before the guests already inside were allowed to leave.2 The government has also built a 5000 room quarantine facility on the outskirts of Guangzhou to house domestic and international travelers for at least two weeks of quarantine.3

In their paper,1 Gao and colleagues wrote that public health measures for covid-19 could change with the introduction of vaccines in China and elsewhere.

“PCR testing strategies will be adjusted to fit the changing epidemiological situation in China—probably one in which few or fewer non-pharmaceutical interventions will be needed for effective epidemic control,” the authors wrote. “Throughout 2020, PCR testing served the public well, helping to make and keep China nearly free of SARS-CoV-2 and providing socioeconomic space and time for vaccine development and long term prevention and control of COVID-19.”