China’s economic powerhouse Guangdong lowers coronavirus threat level amid drive to get economy going again
- Province had been worst hit area outside Hubei, but authorities decide some controls can be eased after number of new cases reported slows
- Beijing has been pushing to get people back to work with President Xi Jinping urging officials to lower the emergency response level where possible
China’s southern economic powerhouse of Guangdong lowered its public health emergency response to the Covid-19 epidemic on Monday, offering relief to some businesses.
A Grade I alert – the highest level – had been in force for a month and the decision to lower it to a Grade II was matched by five other provinces and came amid a government push to get the country’s economy moving again.
On Sunday, President Xi Jinping addressed tens of thousands of officials across the country in a rare teleconference in which he told them to vary disease control measures depending on local conditions, and to downgrade emergency response levels where possible.
Guangdong, which neighbours Hong Kong, has been the worst-hit province after Hubei, the epicentre of the outbreak, with 1,345 confirmed cases of infection and six deaths. But the number of new cases reported each day has fallen to single digits over the past week.
Zhong Nanshan, the Guangdong-based respiratory expert who is leading the country’s response to the coronavirus that causes Covid-19, told state television on Monday that a high degree of public awareness allowed the province to lower its response.