New local cases found infected by Delta variant

Shanghai's five new locally transmitted COVID-19 cases, reported on Friday and Saturday, have been confirmed to have been infected by the Delta variant from overseas sources, the city's health authorities said on Monday.

All patients were staff servicing foreign cargo aircraft at the Shanghai Pudong International Airport.

After genetic sequencing tests and analysis by the city's disease control and prevention center – and confirmed by the national center – they were found to be infected by the hyper-contagious Delta variant.

They were infected because they were exposed to people or environments bearing the overseas virus due to their cursory pandemic prevention activity, the authorities said.

They had no connection with recent outbreaks in other parts of the country.

They also had no contact history with people from high- or medium-risk regions from other cities, no travel history to those areas, and no contact with the cold chain before they were found infected, according to the center.

They all had received two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine and were found to be positive during regular nucleic acid tests.

All people related to or close contacts of the five cases had been tested twice – and were negative – by Monday morning.

The five are being treated at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center.