Delta outbreak in China’s Fujian puts more than 50 children in hospital isolation
- CDC says the outbreak might have started with a man infected during centralised quarantine rather than someone bringing it into the country
- There are now clusters in three of the province’s coastal cities with movements restricted and mass testing continuing
The outbreak could have started with a man infected during centralised quarantine, rather than an imported case as was previously assumed, according to an official from the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.
Officials originally thought the man, who returned from Singapore in August, was infected from abroad – even though he went through a lengthy quarantine period and tested negative multiple times.
Wang Huaqing, chief immunisation expert at the CDC, said the new conclusion was reached after conducting epidemiological investigations, lab tests and genome sequencing.
The latest cases were spread across three coastal cities which have been the focal points of the outbreak, with 38 in Putian, eight in Xiamen, and two in Quanzhou, health authorities said on Thursday morning. They bring the total infections to 2o4, including asymptomatic cases, in a week since the outbreak was detected. There was a slight decrease from the previous two days, when 50 or more new cases were added.
China also reported one local case in its southwestern Yunnan province, although the source of the infection was not immediately clear. There have been no deaths reported.