Chinese city turns traffic lights red as it raises Covid-19 barricades
- Zhuanghe closes roads to discourage travel after outbreak reaches nearby port of Dalian
- Country records 68 new local infections, falling from the midweek high, but Liaoning province moves to contain its first cases
Eight cases in the port city of Dalian were the first infections of the current outbreak in the province, which borders North Korea.
Dalian’s health authorities on Thursday asked residents not to leave the city unless necessary, after discovering the first infection. Local media reported that Zhuanghe, a city of about 820,000 people governed by the Dalian authorities, turned its traffic lights to red and halted road travel except for vehicles with special permission.
In addition to the 68 new symptomatic cases nationally, there were 10 imported cases and a further 42 asymptomatic cases, 20 of them imported.
The wave’s epicentre of Heilongjiang province, also in the northeast, has started vaccinating children aged three to 11 and offering people booster shots. It accounts for about 30 per cent of cases in the outbreak.