Team sent to Anhui to guide virus response

A working group from Beijing was sent on Sunday to Anhui province, which reported COVID-19 infections recently, to guide the epidemic control effort, the National Health Commission said.

The group, sent under the Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism of the State Council, visited designated hospitals, disease control and prevention centers and communities that are subject to special management.

It also provided guidance on such matters as source tracing, nucleic acid testing, prevention and control, medical treatment and infection prevention at hospitals.

Anhui confirmed two new locally transmitted cases on Sunday, increasing its total to seven since Thursday, when first local cases emerged during a new round of the infections.

As of Sunday, the province had also reported seven asymptomatic carriers, all in Lu'an. Of those seven confirmed cases, five are in Lu'an while the rest are in Hefei, the provincial capital.

Lu'an raised the COVID-19 alert level in four residential communities from low-risk to medium-risk on Sunday, according to the city's health commission.

Health authorities in Anhui said all recent infections are related to an offline training session at a photo studio in the Yu'an district of Lu'an.

Five locally transmitted COVID-19 cases were reported on Sunday on the Chinese mainland by the National Health Commission, including the two in Anhui and three in Liaoning province.

Liaoning began reporting new locally transmitted COVID-19 cases on Friday. Since then, it has confirmed nine cases and eight asymptomatic carriers as of Sunday. Most of the cases are in Yingkou, a port city in Liaoning, while the rest are in Shenyang, the provincial capital.

Anhui and Liaoning moved quickly to stop the spread of the infection. In Liaoning, more than 2,800 close contacts with people having COVID-19 have been quarantined and more than 38,000 people are in home quarantine, Shenyang Daily reported.

Lu'an and Hefei in Anhui have tested more than 1.2 million residents.