East China city orders routine nucleic acid testing for COVID-19

HANGZHOU -- The eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou on Thursday ordered routine nucleic acid testing for local residents as it strives to cut off transmission of the highly contagious omicron variant of COVID-19.

Residents in the capital of Zhejiang Province need to take a nucleic acid test every 48 hours starting Thursday, according to a press briefing held by the provincial government. Those that fail to take a test will be banned from entering public places or taking public transport.

Local health authorities have set up no less than 10,000 testing sites offering free testing services in the city, which has a permanent population of 12.2 million.

Zhejiang reported eight locally transmitted confirmed COVID-19 cases and five local asymptomatic carriers in the first 15 hours of Thursday. It has reported 617 locally transmitted confirmed cases in the latest outbreak since March 3. It currently also has 662 asymptomatic carriers.

The province has taken a spate of stringent measures to stop virus transmission in residential communities as quickly as possible in a bid to reduce the impact on social and economic development as well as on people's work and lives.