Beijing’s biggest district starts COVID-19 mass testing

Beijing kicked off three rounds of COVID-19 testing for all residents of its biggest district Chaoyang on Monday, after dozens of cases were reported.

Authorities in Chaoyang, ordered residents and those who work in a home to 3.45 million people to undergo testing this week as Beijing warned against the virus in the city for about a week before being detected.

However, it’s prompted many people to stock up on food over fears of an eventual strict Shanghai-style lockdown.

Since Friday, Beijing has reported 47 locally transmitted cases, with Chaoyang accounting for more than half of them.

“The current outbreak in Beijing is spreading stealthily from sources that remained unknown yet and is developing rapidly,” a municipality official said on Sunday.

“More than a dozen buildings in Chaoyang have been put under lockdown. For the rest of the district, people were to be tested on Monday and again on Wednesday and Friday.”

In Beijing, supermarket chains including Carrefour and Wumart said, they had more than doubled inventories, while Meituan’s grocery-focused e-commerce platform increased stocks and the number of staffers for sorting and delivery.

Reuters