Authorities in China have started imposing another lockdown as the daily COVID-19 toll rose to over 3000 on Sunday.
Gatekeepers News reports that China reported 3,393 new Covid-19 cases on Sunday, according to the National Health Commission. The new figure is more than double the previous day.
Due to the surge in COVID-19 cases, authorities have closed schools in Shanghai and lockdown several northeastern cities, as almost 19 provinces battle local outbreaks of the Omicron and Delta variants.
An official announced on Sunday that the city of Jilin has been partially locked down, with hundreds of neighbourhoods sealed up.
Residents of Jilin have completed six rounds of mass testing, local officials said. On Sunday the city reported over 500 cases of the Omicron variant.
The neighbouring city of Changchun — an industrial base of nine million people — was locked down Friday.
“[The outbreak] reflects that the spread of the Omicron variant is hidden, highly contagious, rapid and difficult to detect in the early stages,” said Jilin provincial health official Zhang Yan at a Sunday press briefing.
“It also reflects the rapid rise of the virus situation in individual regions and the lack of expansion capacity of medical resources, resulting in limited centralised admission and treatment in a short period of time.”
Gatekeepers News reports that the mayor of Jilin and the head of the Changchun health commission were dismissed from their jobs on Saturday.
The smaller cities of Siping and Dunhua, both in Jilin province, were locked down on Thursday and Friday, according to official announcements.
Local authorities said Hunchun city, bordering Russia and North Korea, was locked down on March 1.
