Coronavirus: China traces path of infected tourists, closes popular sites to contain new outbreak

Outbreak comes as country prepares for tough control measures to fend off a potential double epidemic of seasonal influenza and Covid-19

Retired professors were first to test positive in Xian after visiting Inner Mongolia, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces

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Dayan Pagoda, or Giant Wild Goose Pagoda, in Xian is among sites visited by a group of tourists who have since tested positive for coronavirus. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 1:13pm, 18 Oct 2021Updated: 10:55pm, 18 Oct 2021

China has recorded a new community outbreak involving eight people as it braces for a challenging winter of Covid-19 control.

A couple of retired university professors from Shanghai tested positive in the tourist city of Xian in Shaanxi province late on Friday. Later their travel companions – two couples from Shanghai and the southern city of Haikou and another man from Shanghai, all in their 60s – returned positive tests on Sunday and were treated in Xian.

Their close contact – whose age and gender was not revealed – in Yinchuan, in the Ningxia Hui autonomous region, had been travelling in Gansu province with them and was traced by health authorities in Yinchuan after returning home and returning a positive test result.

The source of infection is not known.

The couple who were first to be diagnosed left Shanghai on October 9 and travelled to popular tourist attractions in Inner Mongolia, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces before being confirmed with Covid-19.

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