Shanghai’s government said it is just a step away from bringing the pandemic under control, even as the number of cases jumped for the first time in 19 days. The city is aiming to achieve its “societal zero-Covid” target by May 20, Wu Qing, the city’s executive vice-mayor, told a press briefing on Friday morning. The term adopted by the authorities refers to a situation when new cases are limited to only people in quarantine, and is expected to herald the loosening of the strict measures that have been in place for almost seven weeks. A total of 2,096 infections were discovered in the last 24 hours, a jump of 44.7 per cent from a day earlier, according to data released on Friday. Symptomatic cases climbed 57.6 per cent to 227, while two patients died. The rebound in new daily cases, the first since April 24, did not stop the local government from expressing confidence in its ability to contain the pandemic , which has infected 616,000 people in the city of 25 million since March 1. “The outbreak is stabilising and the situation is improving although some small fluctuations [of new cases] are seen,” said Wu. “After all, more than 99 per cent of new infections were detected in quarantine areas, which have already been sealed off.” The prospect of societal zero-Covid is seen as a watershed in Shanghai’s anti-pandemic work. “If the city were to bring new cases in the low-risk zones to zero or near zero in the coming days, the citywide lockdown would be lifted at a gradual pace,” said Meng Tianying, a senior executive at Shanghai-based consultancy Domo Medical. “But Friday’s data does not appear to be an encouraging sign because the Omicron variant is highly transmissible.” On Thursday, Shanghai detected four infections in the unguarded zones – “precautionary zones” without a single infection in the previous 14 days – and their surrounding areas, double the number a day earlier. Local officials hoped to eliminate the virus in communities before shifting focus to stopping it from spilling into quarantine areas such as hospitals. The municipal government ordered another round of mass testing that covers nearly all 25 million residents on Friday, a renewed effort to spot new infections and isolate them swiftly. Wu said more companies would be allowed to restart operations soon, as the city looks to put the local economy back on track following a lockdown that started on April 1. About 1,800 manufacturers on the so-called white list have been approved by the Shanghai government since mid-April to operate in “closed loops” – workers essentially sleeping on site to avoid contact with outsiders. Those companies, including Tesla and China’s largest chip maker, Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp, are operating at a fraction of their capacity because of a strained supply chain and lack of dormitories needed to accommodate assembly workers to comply with the closed-loop system. A survey of 142 Shanghai-based companies by the official Shanghai Securities News showed only 30 per cent of their production capacity was up and running as of May 7. Wu Jincheng, head of the Shanghai Commission of Economy and Information Technology, told the briefing that another 2,600 large-scale manufacturing businesses had received the go-ahead to resume production recently, taking the total to about 4,400 firms. Companies based in districts where the societal zero-Covid goal had been achieved were encouraged to rev up production to make up for the past seven weeks. In the southwestern district of Jinshan, 70 per cent of major manufacturers have restarted operations, Wu said. “It is still inconvenient for manufacturers to operate under the closed-loop system,” said Wang Feng, chairman of Shanghai-based financial services group Ye Lang Capital. “All companies are expecting the municipality to reopen public transport and lift the ban on private cars soon, allowing all employees to return to work.”