Infections Stay High In Shanghai As Lockdown Goes On

Local Covid cases in Shanghai remained high on Saturday as the city continued its lockdown and testing to curb the spread of Omicron.

The daily tally of symptomatic cases in the city dropped to 260 compared to 368 the day before, but asymptomatic infections rose to 6,051 cases – from 4,144 reported the previous day.

Officials say the number of infections recorded had increased because of wider screening, with more than 14 million people tested during the continuing lockdown in the area west of the Huangpu river, Puxi.

Residents living in areas east of the river, Pudong, meanwhile, are still required to stay at home or are restricted within their neighbourhood, depending on the results of previous testing.

The epidemic situation remains severe and complicated, and infection control is extremely difficult, city authorities said.

Overall, the mainland reported 2,086 local symptomatic cases, up from 1,787 on Friday.

More than 1,700 cases were reported from the northeastern province of Jilin .

The number of new local asymptomatic cases nationwide rose to 7,789, compared to 5,442 cases the day before.