Lockdown in Chinese city enters seventh day, with more cases reported

BEIJING • A lockdown in the Chinese city of Xi'an entered its seventh day yesterday with many people unable to leave their homes and virtually dependent on deliveries of necessities as new Covid-19 infections persisted.

Xi'an reported 151 domestically transmitted infections with confirmed symptoms for Tuesday, or nearly all of the 152 cases nationwide, bringing the total number of local Xi'an cases to nearly 1,000 during the Dec 9 to 28 period. No cases of the Omicron variant have been announced in the city of 13 million people.

While the Xi'an outbreak is small compared with outbreaks in many other places around the world, officials imposed tough curbs within the city on Dec 23, in line with Beijing's drive to contain outbreaks as they appear.

Since Monday, the Xi'an government has stopped granting permission to people seeking to leave their homes to buy essentials, as epidemic containment measures rose a notch. It said in-person shopping could be allowed for people in less risky areas once mass testing returned negative results, but it did not say exactly when the stay-at-home order would be lifted.

Several district-level governments in Xi'an have started arranging grocery deliveries for residents, the city government said. The authorities also started a new round of citywide testing yesterday.

There were no new Covid-19 deaths in mainland China for Tuesday, leaving the death toll at 4,636. Mainland China had 101,683 confirmed symptomatic cases as at Tuesday.

Meanwhile, talks are under way between the United States and China on possible changes to the Chinese government's new aircraft-cleaning requirements, which could trigger the cancellation of some flights to the Asian nation. The new rules had prompted a Delta Air Lines flight to turn back to Seattle.

The new sanitation mandates - spurred by the spread of Covid-19 - significantly extend the time that planes are on the ground and largely copy steps that US airlines already take, according to industry representatives.

They added that there also is a shortage of available workers to carry out the additional steps.

China has been stepping up border restrictions because of Delta variant outbreaks and the detection of cases of the new strain among foreign travellers ahead of the Beijing Winter Olympics in early February.

The US is seeking changes to the new Chinese cleaning mandates, since rigorous disinfecting procedures are already performed between flights by carriers globally, a State Department official said.

The new rules apply to any airline flying into China.

It was not immediately clear what sanitation procedures the authorities in China recently put in place.

REUTERS, BLOOMBERG