Shanghai to be low-risk for COVID-19 from midnight
Volunteers in hazmat suits deliver festive supplies to quarantined villagers in Fengxian District, Shanghai's last remaining medium-risk area for COVID-19.
Shanghai will downgrade its last remaining medium-risk area for COVID-19 from midnight Monday after a resurgence of the epidemic was brought under control.
Following the downgrade, the entire city of Shanghai will be deemed low-risk for the epidemic, the city's COVID-19 prevention and control authority said on Sunday.
Lockdown of the Group 8 area of Xingfu Village, Fengcheng Town of outskirt Fengxian District will be lifted at midnight.
It was listed as a medium-risk area last month with two COVID-19 cases. A staffer handling import business in the cargo area of the Pudong International Airport was confirmed as a new COVID-19 case in Shanghai on January 23. His wife also tested positive later.
All people in the area are subject to multiple rounds of nucleic acid testing until the end of the quarantine. They are confined to their homes during the period, including the Spring Festival holiday.
"We've spent the most special and impressive Chinese New Year under lockdown," said Wei Zhibin, 50. He said the quarantine staff have been serving them well and made the festival happy and peaceful.
A minivan loaded with Spring Festival supplies drove into the village to deliver food ingredients for Chinese New Year Eve dinners.
The operation of Pudong airport, both passenger and cargo flights, has not been affected amid the busy Spring Festival travel rush, according to the airport authority.
Amid a new wave in the global pandemic caused by the Omicron variant, Shanghai has reported a surging number of imported cases via Pudong airport.
The authority had tightened the "closed-loop" management on human, cargo and the environment at the airport. Cargo and passenger aircraft have been strictly separated, as well as overseas and domestic flights, according to the authority.
