Residential area in Pudong listed as middle-risk after couple confirmed infected with coronavirus

Ti Gong

A residential area in Zhoupu Town in the Pudong New Area has been marked as a middle-risk zone after a couple tested positive for the novel coronavirus on Friday night, the city’s health authority said on Saturday.

Mingtianhuacheng residential area of Pudong’s Zhoupu Town, where the couple lives, has since been added to the city’s list of coronavirus medium-risk regions, which include Yingqian Village, in Zhuqiao Town of Pudong where another infection was confirmed early this month. 

The 39-year-old husband, surnamed Wu, is a safety inspector at West Cargo Terminal, Pudong International Airport. He was quarantined with a high fever after being found to have inflammation in his lungs at Zhoupu Hospital in Pudong, said Li Guohua, the deputy head of the new area.

The 34-year-old wife, surnamed Li, had a sore throat with a fever. She went to the fever clinic of Shanghai Pudong Hospital, where she works, on Friday and was isolated soon after.

They have been transferred to the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center for quarantine and treatment after tested positive for COVID-19.

They have been to Wanglou Village in Hangtou Town and Jingxin residential area of Xindong Village in Zhuqiao Town in Pudong within 14 days. All the places, as well as the school where their daughter studies, have been under closed management and disinfected. The students will now study online.

Outpatient and emergency services have been stopped at Shanghai Pudong Hospital. And 4,015 medical staff, workers, patients and other related people have been quarantined in the hospital. All hospitalized patients will be treated at the same place under the closed-loop system, Li said.

There is no evidence that both newly confirmed COVID-19 cases are related to the last local case diagnosed in early November, of a person who also works at the Pudong airport. The previous case lives in Pudong's Zhuqiao, while the couple lives in Zhoupu, Li said.

The source tracing for the new cases is underway, Dr Zhang Wenhong, head of Shanghai’s expert team for the treatment of coronavirus patients, said.

As of 8am on Saturday, 86 close contacts, including six family members, had been quarantined and received the first round of nucleic acid testing. All of them tested negative.

Another 8,120 people have been tested. As of 8:30am, 4,468 samples are clear of the virus. And 336 samples from the related areas, such as food and goods, were tested, and four items from the patients’ home were positive.

As a medium-risk region, people from Mingtianhuacheng residential area are not allowed to leave Shanghai unless they have a negative nucleic acid test certificate within seven days, said Wu Jinglei, director of the Shanghai Health Commission.

With the arrival of winter and the spread of the epidemic in the world, the risk of the coronavirus entering the city and the country will increase, epically via logistics and cold-chain transportation, Zhang said.

“There is no need to be surprised or panic about the new sporadic cases," he added.

There are 125 medical institutes, including hospitals and community clinics, which have the nucleic acid test capability in the city. And 621,000 samples can be tested every day, Wu said.

Enough beds and many specialized CT machines have been placed in local hospitals for the medical observation for the coronavirus, Wu added.

The city will further enhance the training of medical workers to diagnose COVID-19 cases as soon as possible, Wu said.