Beijing eases control measures as outbreak contained

Beijing has lifted some control measures as the city's latest COVID-19 outbreak has been effectively contained and the epidemic situation is showing a downward trend, said a senior official at a news conference on Saturday afternoon.

The authority will adopt different control measures in districts and regions based on their different epidemic situations starting on Sunday, said Xu Hejian, spokesman of the city government.

Residents in Fangshan and Shunyi districts can go to work normally and companies in Chaoyang and Tongzhou districts can have more employees to go to workplaces instead of working from home.

Public transportation, including buses and subways in Chaoyang, Shunyi and Fangshan, will be resumed except for the lines in locked down and controlled zones.

Shopping malls outside of the locked down and controlled zones are allowed to open while the sales and promotions that could cause crowds should continue to be suspended.

Libraries, museums, cinemas, galleries and other cultural and sports facilities in districts where no COVID-19 cases were reported in past seven days can resume operation with the maximum number of visitors kept under half of the full reception capacity.

Meanwhile, some control measures will be strictly continued to avoid risks of infection.

All the restaurants should continue to suspend dine-in service and students from kindergarten to senior high schools should not go back to campuses for schooling.

Beijing reported 12 new locally transmitted cases as of 3 pm on Saturday, bringing the total number of infections to 1,716 since April 22, according to Liu Xiaofeng, deputy director of the Beijing Center for Disease Prevention and Control, at the news conference on Saturday afternoon.

"All of the new infections were reported in quarantined locations, and no cases were found from mass nucleic acid tests at community levels," Liu said.

Of all the 1,716 cases so far, Chaoyang district registered 423, the most amid the current outbreak, followed by Fangshan, which announced 413. Fengtai reported 370 and Haidian 245 during the period.

As of Saturday, Beijing had seven high-risk areas for COVID-19 and 16 medium-risk areas.