This archive report was first published on 1 August 2021.
China's record of largely snuffing out the pandemic within its borders last year has been thrown into jeopardy by the fast-spreading Delta variant, which broke out at Nanjing airport in eastern Jiangsu province in July.
As of Sunday, China reported 75 new coronavirus cases, with 53 local transmissions. Authorities have conducted three rounds of testing on the city's 9.2 million residents and placed hundreds of thousands under lockdown in an effort to curb the outbreak.
Health officials are also scrambling to track more than 5,000 people nationwide who attended a theatre festival in Zhangjiajie, a tourist city in Hunan province, which has locked down all 1.5 million residents and shut all tourist attractions after four visitors tested positive.
“Zhangjiajie has now become the new ground zero for China's epidemic spread,” virologist Zhong Nanshan told reporters Saturday. “We must cast the net wider when tracing close contacts of the Delta variant.”
Beijing has cut all rail, bus and air links with areas where coronavirus cases have been found, and has closed its doors to tourists during the peak summer holiday travel season.
More than 1.65 billion vaccine doses have so far been administered nationwide as of Saturday, Beijing's National Health Commission said.
