Omicron: Chinese city of Qingdao reports Covid-19 outbreak among students

The 88 new coronavirus infections in Qingdao fuel year’s high in daily local caseload

The outbreak is mainly among middle school students in Laixi county, which will start a second round of mass testing on Monday

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Immigration inspection officers in protective gear near a container ship berthed at Qingdao, in eastern China’s Shandong province. Photo: AP

Published: 12:09pm, 6 Mar 2022Updated: 4:22pm, 6 Mar 2022

The eastern Chinese port city of Qingdao has reported 88 new coronavirus cases, all of them of the Omicron variant, fuelling China’s highest number of daily locally transmitted cases so far this year.

China recorded 329 new coronavirus cases on Saturday, 175 of them locally transmitted, the National Health Commission said, compared with 102 local cases a day earlier.

The Qingdao outbreak was mainly among middle school students in Laixi county, the city’s municipal health commission said.

Laixi county will implement a second round of mass testing on Monday, a Qingdao official said, adding that there was no major risk of further outbreak.

China’s “dynamic clearance” approach to Covid-19 aims to shut off transmission routes as soon as new cases are detected.

The Qingdao outbreak helped send China’s total local confirmed case count to its highest since December 31, with other cases reported mainly in Jilin, Guangdong and Hebei provinces.

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