This archive report was first published on 28 June 2020.
China has locked down nearly half a million people in a province surrounding Beijing to contain a fresh coronavirus cluster, as authorities warn the outbreak is still severe and complicated.
On Sunday, health officials announced that Anxin county, about 150 kilometers from Beijing, would be fully enclosed and controlled, with strict measures similar to those imposed at the height of the pandemic in Wuhan earlier this year.
Only one person from each family will be allowed to go out once a day to purchase necessities such as food and medicine, according to the county's epidemic prevention task force.
Beijing has reported 311 cases of the virus since mid-June, with 14 new cases reported in the past 24 hours, prompting the testing of millions of residents.
The outbreak was first detected in Beijing's Xinfadi wholesale food market, which supplies much of the city's fresh produce, sparking concerns over the safety of the food supply chain.
Businesses in Anxin county had supplied freshwater fish to the Xinfadi market, state news agency Xinhua reported.
Some 12 cases of the novel coronavirus were found in the county, including 11 linked to Xinfadi, the state-run Global Times reported.
Beijing has mass-tested wholesale market workers, restaurant workers, residents of medium and high-risk neighborhoods, and delivery couriers over the past two weeks.
At a press conference on Sunday, officials said 8.3 million samples have been collected so far, of which 7.7 million have already been tested.
Testing has now expanded to include all employees of the city's beauty parlors and hair salons, the Global Times said.
Beijing city official Xu Hejian warned that the epidemic situation in the capital is severe and complicated, and that the city needed to continue tracing the spread of the virus.
City officials have urged people not to leave Beijing, closed schools again, and locked down dozens of residential compounds to stamp out the virus.
However, Wu Zunyou, chief epidemiology expert at the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters last week that the new outbreak had been brought under control, and officials lifted a weeks-long lockdown imposed on seven Beijing communities on Friday.
