Shanghai authorities have again tightened restrictions on the coronavirus just as the city emerged from lunar isolation due to the COVID-19 outbreak, according to the Associated Press.
Residents of several districts of the city were ordered to stay at home and were forbidden to receive non-essential goods during the “quiet period”, which will last at least until Wednesday. The ban may be extended depending on the results of mass tests.
“Thank you for your understanding and cooperation. Together, we will be able to remove the blockade as soon as possible,” said one of the messages released in the Huangpu metropolitan area and posted on the Internet.
It is unclear what led to the resumption of restrictions, given that the number of new cases of COVID-19 in the city continues to decline, according to the AP.
Today, Shanghai reported 3,947 cases in the past 24 hours, almost all of which were asymptomatic, and 11 deaths. Authorities have gradually lifted isolation rules for the city’s 25 million residents, but with the introduction of new rules, there has been a return to the conditions observed in the early stages of the outbreak, according to BTA.
In Shanghai, a decision was initially made on mass testing and limited blocking, but after increasing the number of patients, the restrictions were expanded. Thousands of residents were forced to be placed in centralized quarantine centers because they passed a positive test or were simply in contact with an infected person.