Omicron has spread from Tianjin to Henan weeks before Winter Olympics, Lunar New Year
- Two cases of the highly infectious Covid-19 strain found in city of Anyang on Sunday, traced to a student who travelled there nearly two weeks ago
- Tianjin has meanwhile imposed travel restrictions and mass testing, with Games and Lunar New Year holiday fast approaching
The Omicron outbreak in the northern Chinese port city of Tianjin spread to central Henan nearly two weeks ago but was only discovered by health officials on Sunday.
In Henan – where several places are battling Delta outbreaks – Anyang city authorities on Monday said two Omicron infections were found on Sunday and genome sequencing showed their origin was the same as cases identified in the Jinnan district of Tianjin.
The Anyang cases were detected during compulsory mass screening that is being carried out in the city as officials try to contain a Delta outbreak. They were traced to a university student infected with Omicron who returned to Anyang from Tianjin – a distance of about 500km (310 miles) – on December 28, but the case was only found on Saturday, the city authorities said.
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Tianjin authorities have responded by imposing travel curbs and rolling out compulsory mass testing for the city’s 14 million residents, among other measures.
Residents cannot leave the city unless they have approval to do so, Gu Qing, director of the Tianjin Health Commission, told reporters on Monday. They also need to show a negative test result from within 48 hours before departure, and their “health code” on the Covid-19 smartphone app must be green, indicating they are from a low-risk area.
More than 9.6 million people had undergone testing in the latest round of mass screening as of Sunday afternoon, Gu said, and more than 75,000 people were in quarantine.
Authorities have also sought to restrict travel from Tianjin to Beijing, which will host the Winter Olympics from February 4. Barricades have been set up on highways to Beijing and the sale of train tickets from Tianjin to Beijing has been halted.
University students in Tianjin have been told to stay on campus, while schools in the Binhai New Area – where most of the cases have been found – have been suspended. Tour groups have also been barred from the city.
While Tianjin has not imposed a lockdown, some subway lines have been closed, bus services have been cancelled and people in high-risk areas have been told to isolate at home.
It comes after President Xi Jinping, inspecting Winter Olympics facilities last week, said one of the top priorities for local officials was to prevent the spread of Covid-19.
Across China, there were 97 new local symptomatic cases reported on Monday, and two local asymptomatic cases. There were also 100 imported cases, of which 60 were symptomatic. Fifteen new local symptomatic cases were reported in the northwestern city of Xian, whose 13 million residents have been locked down for nearly three weeks.
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In Tianjin, students are worried about whether they will be able to travel home to see their families for the Lunar New Year, which starts on February 1.
Ginny Yang, a master’s student at Tianjin University, said they could only leave campus with a valid reason. “I feel so homesick now,” Yang said. “I managed to get through the first semester of my master’s but I’ll be so sad if I can’t [return home to] see my family.”
But another student at the university, Zora Kong, said she had managed to leave Tianjin on Saturday, a day before the travel restrictions began, and she was not the only one. “Some of my classmates have already travelled back home because they were worried about the situation in Tianjin deteriorating,” Kong said.
