By the end of October, China had recorded a total of 85,997 Covid-19 infections and 4,634 deaths. Around 90 per cent of confirmed cases were recorded before March.

A people’s war

On September 8, President Xi Jinping used an awards ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing to hail China’s success in suppressing the Covid-19 pandemic, which he said had been achieved through the leadership of the Communist Party.

“We quickly achieved initial success in the people’s war against the coronavirus. We are leading the world in economic recovery and in the fight against Covid-19,” he said.

At the time of the ceremony, China had reported no new domestic infections of the disease in more than three weeks. None of the 1,500 honoured individuals wore masks in the photo session with Xi.

Testing times

Following the September celebration of China’s success in curbing the pandemic, a handful of new clusters have been found in some parts of the country. These have been brought under control with mass testing and strict lockdowns, according to officials.

Authorities say they are able to conduct millions of tests in just a few days thanks to pool testing, in which batches of between five and 10 samples – sometimes more – are tested at once. When a batch tests positive, medical workers go back and carry out individual tests to trace the positive patients within the group.

Xinjiang – late October 2020

The latest cluster, in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, was detected on October 24 during a routine screening of a 17-year-old girl who worked at a clothing factory in Shufu county on the outskirts of Kashgar. Officials said she showed no symptoms and did not have any travel history outside the country.

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China’s city of Kashgar finds 137 new coronavirus cases after infected teen sets off mass testing

China’s city of Kashgar finds 137 new coronavirus cases after infected teen sets off mass testing

Health authorities say 4.7 million Covid-19 tests were carried out across Kashgar in response to the girl’s positive test. The city was put back into lockdown, its second since a strict stay-home order was imposed for weeks in mid-July when more than 900 cases were reported.

During a visit to Kashgar in the first week of November, Vice-Premier Sun Chunlan said counties in Xinjiang should keep up with “wartime conditions” to stop the spread of the disease. “The cluster cases in Kashgar were discovered early with a timely emergency response mechanism and decisive measures, so the epidemic is manageable,” she said.

As of November 8, Xinjiang had reported 78 confirmed infections and 352 asymptomatic cases – people who tested positive but had no symptoms – during the latest outbreak.

Brave ‘wartime conditions’ to stop Covid-19, vice-premier tells Kashgar

Qingdao – mid-October 2020

This outbreak, which involved 12 Covid-19 patients in the eastern port city of Qingdao, was believed to have been triggered by two dock workers who handled the outer packaging of frozen cod. They became infected in late September and were admitted to Qingdao Chest Hospital.

Officials believe the virus then spread via the hospital’s CAT scan room, which was not disinfected properly after the men were scanned. This led to an outbreak within the hospital, with more people infected.

Live coronavirus was later found on the packages handled by the two workers, but officials did not know whether the workers were infected by the packages or had contaminated the packages after contracting the virus elsewhere.

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China to test all 9 million people in port city of Qingdao after cluster of only 12 cases found

China to test all 9 million people in port city of Qingdao after cluster of only 12 cases found

Beijing – mid-June 2020

When 256 local cases were reported between June 11 and June 23 in the capital Beijing, they marked China’s first recorded domestic infections in 55 days.

A wholesale food market in the city’s southwestern district of Fengtai was identified as the centre of the outbreak when the coronavirus was traced to chopping boards used for imported salmon. The district head and a market official were later dismissed, taking the blame for the outbreak.

Schools and entertainment venues were closed. Travel restrictions were imposed on residents from medium and high-risk areas, and massive testing was conducted to curb the spread of the disease.

Mainland officials said the coronavirus found in Beijing could be traced to similar strains found in Europe, according to genomic and epidemiological study results. The virus strain is believed to have come to the market through people and goods.

When was China’s worst outbreak?

Since the virus was first reported in late December 2019 in Wuhan, provincial capital of Hubei in central China, the country experienced its most serious outbreak around late January and February. Hundreds of cases were being recorded each day during this period, with at least 3-digit – and sometimes 4-digit – jumps in daily infections.

The highest number of new cases reported in a single day by health authorities was 15,152 on February 12. It was a sharp spike compared to the number of infections in the preceding days, marking a seven-fold surge from the day before.

Numbers decreased dramatically the next day, by a factor of three. Officials said the surge on February 12 was due to a change in how cases were diagnosed and reported in Hubei. From that date, new infections could be diagnosed by trained medical professionals based on CAT scans. Previously, these cases had been counted as “suspected” or “probable” infections.

Beijing later adjusted its definition again, requiring all new confirmed cases to have a laboratory confirmation.