A health worker takes a swab from a resident to be tested for COVID-19.
Beijing, China:
More than three million samples were taken in a few days in Qingdao, the Chinese port city where a minor coronavirus epidemic has sparked a radical health response.
Queues for testing extended into Monday night across the eastern city, which detected six cases of the virus the day before but quickly moved into action to ward off a larger outbreak. large.
In scenes that contrast with the clumsy efforts of other countries to establish effective testing regimes, Qingdao health workers in protective gear set up tents to take samples in the neighborhoods, where parents brought them all. -small for testing.
Residents said on social media that community representatives had informed them of their nearest testing stations, with local districts helping organize sample collection for mass testing.
“At 8 am … our city took 3.08 million samples for nucleic acid testing, with 1.11 million results received,” the Qingdao health commission said in a statement Tuesday.
In addition to six people showing symptoms, six asymptomatic cases have been detected so far.
The city has said it wants to test its entire population – around 9.4 million – within five days of detecting the first cases in a hospital on Sunday.
It was not immediately clear how quickly the results could be processed, although China has flaunted its rapid testing capabilities in previous minor outbreaks.
The ruling Communist Party in China is desperate to show its ability to deal with the pandemic to its citizens – as well as a foreign audience – after it emerged in the central city of Wuhan.
The country has rebounded since the virus emerged late last year and forced widespread lockdowns that have hammered the world‘s second-largest economy.
China is also desperate to be the first country to produce a coronavirus vaccine, with several companies in final stages of testing.
(This story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
