BEIJING (REUTERS, AFP) - Beijing authorities imposed more restrictions to stop the spread of a fresh outbreak of coronavirus in the Chinese capital to other provinces, banning outbound travel of high-risk people and suspending some transportation services out of the city.

Beijing officials reported on Tuesday (June 16) 27 new confirmed Covid-19 cases as of Monday, taking the cumulative number of infections in the city’s current outbreak to 106. Many of the new cases are linked to an outbreak in the city's main wholesale food market, prompting concern from the World Health Organisation and triggering a huge trace and test programme as well as large-scale disinfection.

The Beijing outbreak makes it the most serious flare-up in China since February, stoking fears of a second-wave of the respiratory disease which emerged in the central city of Wuhan late last year and has now infected more than eight million people worldwide.

“The epidemic situation in the capital is extremely severe,” Beijing city spokesman Xu Hejian warned at a press conference. “Right now we have to take strict measures to stop the spread of Covid-19.”

Beijing has disinfected 276 farm produce markets and closed 11 of these underground and semi-underground markets as of 6am on Tuesday, Mr Chen Yankai, deputy director of the municipal market supervision bureau, told a press conference. A total of 33,173 catering service providers have also been disinfected, Xinhua news agency quoted him as saying.

Chinese officials said on Sunday that all cases of infection so far had been linked to the Xinfadi market, which 200,000 people had visited since May 30. More than 8,000 workers from the market have been tested and sent to centralised quarantine facilities.

According to the Global Times, Beijing has locked down 29 communities. Nine out of 11 districts in Beijing have reported confirmed cases, of which Fengtai district is the most stricken area.

Beijing will roll out a citywide inspection and sanitation campaign for wholesale markets, vegetable markets, restaurants and canteens. Vendors and business operators will all undergo nucleic acid tests.

The Tiantao Honglian market in Beijing's Xicheng district became the latest affected local market, triggering a lockdown of seven nearby communities, the Global Times said.

Previously, 10 communities near Yuquan East Food Market in Haidian district and 11 communities near the Xinfadi Market were locked down, in an effort to curb the spread of the deadly virus, the Global Times said.

'WARTIME MODE'

Mr Xu Ying, an official at the city's antivirus leading work group said that on Monday, nearly 100,000 social workers were mobilised in 7,120 communities and villages in Beijing to help fight Covid-19.

"Beijing will raise the prevention level of all communities by resuming temperature checks before entering and disinfection of public areas," the China Daily reported him as saying.

While not in a Wuhan-style lockdown, the Chinese capital has gone into a “wartime” mode on a district level, with local neighbourhoods instituting 24-hour security checkpoints, closing schools and banning wedding banquets.

Overnight, some parts of Beijing including the city’s old-style hutong neighbourhoods were fenced up, with entry and exit restricted to a few round-the-clock security checkpoints.

“We work as usual, but neighbourhood checks have become more strict,” said Beijing resident Jin Rong, 23. “I’m not worried that Beijing will be like Wuhan, because the current epidemic control measures have kicked in very quickly, and have been very strict. People also have a strong sense of self-protection.”

All high-risk people in Beijing, such as close contacts of confirmed cases, are not allowed to leave the city, state media reported on Tuesday, citing municipal officials. Outbound taxi and car-hailing services have also been suspended.

Some long-distance bus routes between Beijing and nearby Hebei and Shandong provinces were suspended on Tuesday. Governments in many parts of China have imposed quarantine requirements on visitors from Beijing.

One suspected case who flew from Beijing to south-western Sichuan province has become a confirmed case, health authorities said on Tuesday, and local officials are rounding up 111 close contacts for observation.

Hebei province reported four new cases, with two having come into direct contact with a virus carrier in the Chinese capital, and one being an operator at the Xinfadi market.

At least three shuttle bus services from Hebei and another from Inner Mongolia to Beijing’s Capital Airport, a major regional transit hub, were suspended. Concerned about contagion risks, many provinces have imposed quarantine requirements on visitors from Beijing.

On Tuesday, Shanghai started to require travellers from medium-to-high risk Covid-19 areas in China to be quarantined for 14 days.

“I’m so worried for Shanghai – just look at the new cases in Beijing,” said local university student Wang Jiahe, 22.

“There is so much daily air and road traffic (between the cities).”

The stakes are high for Shanghai, which has been invited to host two Formula One races this season. United States airlines are also poised to resumes flights to the city.

W.H.O. EXPRESSES CONCERN

The WHO said the new cluster was a cause for concern, given Beijing’s size and connectivity.

“A cluster like this is a concern and it needs to be investigated and controlled – and that is exactly what the Chinese authorities are doing,” WHO emergencies director Mike Ryan said.

Until this recent outbreak, most of the cases in recent months in China have been imported cases brought into the country by Chinese nationals returning home as the pandemic spread to other countries. On Tuesday, there were another eight imported cases reported.

Overall, China reported 40 new confirmed coronavirus cases for Monday, down from 49 a day earlier, the National Health Commission said on Tuesday.

Beijing's 27 new cases is down from 36 a day earlier.

The total number of coronavirus cases in mainland China now stands at 83,221, and the death toll remains unchanged at 4,634. China does not count asymptomatic patients, who are infected with the virus but do not display symptoms, as confirmed cases.