Shanghai’s daily COVID-19 tally dips to around 20,000

Shanghai's daily COVID-19 tally dipped slightly again on Monday, the third consecutive day infection numbers have fallen, according to statistics released by the municipal authorities on Tuesday.

The city's daily tally of new infections dropped from its peak of more than 27,000 to around 20,000 on Monday, with 3,084 confirmed cases and 17,332 asymptomatic infections reported, said the municipal health commission. According to Wu Qianyu, a primary inspector from the Shanghai Municipal Health Commission, 974 confirmed cases were previously registered asymptomatic infections. 

Wu added that a record 23,286 people would be discharged on Tuesday.

The city also reported seven deaths from COVID-19 on Monday, bringing the total number of fatalities in the latest wave to 10. All seven people, aged between 60 and 101, were unvaccinated and had serious pre-existing conditions including coronary heart disease, diabetes, and hypertension, Wu said.

According to Wu Qing, the executive vice-mayor of Shanghai,  mass testing will continue in lockdown zones from Tuesday to Thursday and in controlled zones tomorrow.

To enhance testing efficiency and capacity, the city has mobilized facilities such as research labs of nucleic acid testing and mobile nucleic acid testing vehicles, the vice mayor said at a news briefing on Tuesday.

Medical teams from other cities are helping with the mass testing, and more than 2,000 sample transfer vehicles are being used to speed up the process as well. According to the vice mayor, the daily maximum nucleic acid testing capacity of Shanghai currently stands at roughly 5 million tubes.