China faces new Covid cluster among schoolchildren

Southern Chinese cities closed schools and ordered testing for millions on Tuesday in a race to curb a new Covid-19 outbreak which has sparked concerns over infections among unvaccinated schoolchildren.

Putian, a city of 3.2 million in coastal Fujian province, ordered testing of all residents on Tuesday after Delta variant cases linked to a returnee from Singapore ballooned into a province-wide outbreak of more than 100 people.

China has now been hit by multiple outbreaks of the highly contagious Delta variant after initially vanquishing the first wave of the coronavirus last year.

The Fujian cluster is the biggest rebound in weeks and comes after the country declared the Covid outbreak spurred by the Delta under control, in a test of China’s ‘zero case’ approach to the pandemic.

China reported 59 new domestically transmitted cases on Tuesday, up from 22 the day before, all in Fujian province.

Authorities said the cluster’s suspected patient zero was a man who had recently returned from Singapore and developed symptoms after completing a 14-day quarantine and initially testing negative for the virus.

The man’s 12-year-old son and a classmate were among the first patients detected in the cluster last week, shortly after the new school term began.

The variant then raced through classrooms, infecting more than 36 children including 8 kindergartners, city authorities said Tuesday, in the first major school-linked spread the country has seen since the start of the pandemic.

China has administered more than two billion doses of its coronavirus vaccines as of Sunday, according to the official Xinhua news agency, enough to fully vaccinate around 70 per cent of its population.

But most young children remain unvaccinated, sparking fear that the latest Fujian outbreak could hit the most vulnerable people in the country disproportionately.

The Putian government has ordered schools to stop in-person classes on Monday, while nearby port city Xiamen followed suit on Tuesday and shut down long-distance bus services, while ordering all residents to be tested.

The Chinese embassy in Singapore on Monday warned its citizens to be ‘cautious’ about travelling to the Southeast Asian country and ‘be psychologically and economically prepared’ for difficulties re-entering China.

The novel coronavirus has killed at least 46,36,530 people since the outbreak emerged in China in December 2019, according to a tally from official sources compiled by AFP at 1000 GMT on Tuesday.

At least 22,51,85,240 cases of coronavirus have been registered. On Monday, 7,341 new deaths and 5,86,560 new cases were recorded worldwide.

Based on latest reports, the countries with the most new deaths were United States with 1,554 new deaths, followed by Russia with 781 and Malaysia with 413. The United States is the worst-affected country with 6,62,131 deaths from 4,12,21,315 cases.

After the US, the hardest-hit countries are Brazil with 5,87,066 deaths from 2,10,06,424 cases, India with 4,43,213 deaths from 3,32,89,579 cases, Mexico with 2,67,969 deaths from 35,16,043 cases, and Peru with 1,98,799 deaths from 21,61,358 cases.

Latin America and the Caribbean overall has 14,62,777 deaths from 4,39,90,846 cases, Europe 12,75,994 deaths from 6,51,77,116 infections, and Asia 8,11,814 deaths from 5,21,51,744 cases.

The United States and Canada has reported 6,89,338 deaths from 4,27,64,993 cases, Africa 2,03,365 deaths from 80,69,401 cases, Middle East 1,91,383 deaths from 1,28,84,665 cases, and Oceania 1,859 deaths from 1,46,477 cases.

Russian president Vladimir Putin self-isolates after cases are detected in his inner circle, the Kremlin says, as the country struggles with stubbornly high infection rates.

Australian authorities extend a lockdown of the nation’s capital for a month, saying the measure is necessary until vaccinations are ramped up.

All children in Britain aged 12 to 15 will be offered vaccinations on the advice of four top medical chiefs.

The Philippines is to ease virus restrictions in the capital Manila despite record infection numbers as it seeks to spur economic activity.

The assistant coach of the US ice hockey team Columbus Blue Jackets is fired after refusing to be vaccinated.

AFP