(Fighting against New Coronary Pneumonia) The BA.5.1.7 evolutionary branch of the Omicron variant strain was detected for the first time in mainland China
China News Service, Shaoguan, October 9 (Reporter Wang Jian) The Shaoguan Municipal Government announced on the 9th that there are currently many confirmed cases of imported new coronary pneumonia from multiple sources and chains in the city, resulting in continuous local positive cases.
Among them, the BA.5.1.7 evolutionary branch of the Omicron variant (hereinafter referred to as "BA.5.1.7"), which affected the city, was detected for the first time in mainland China.
According to the Shaoguan Municipal Government, there are mainly two transmission chains in this round of the epidemic, which are transmitted by the BF.7 evolutionary branch and BA.5.1.7 of the Omicron variant strain. They are extremely contagious and spread extremely fast. mutated strains.
At present, the Shaoguan New Coronary Virus Pneumonia Epidemic Prevention and Control Headquarters has implemented temporary enhanced epidemic prevention and control measures in parts of Wujiang District and Zhenjiang District of the city. The control time is planned to last until 24:00 on the 10th.
At the same time, schools of all levels and types in the three districts of Shaoguan City have suspended their return to school for 10 days.
In addition, people who leave Shaoguan to go to other cities need a 48-hour nucleic acid negative certificate.
Li Shujian, deputy director of the Shaoguan Center for Disease Control and Prevention, introduced that BA.5.1.7 of the current transmission chain in Shaoguan was detected for the first time in the mainland, and no other sequences with smaller differences were found in the positive cases previously reported in the mainland.
According to the previous report of the World Health Organization, BA.5 has stronger transmission ability and faster transmission speed than previous strains, and has stronger infectivity and immune escape. At present, BA.5 has been tested in more than 100 countries or regions around the world. By now, it has replaced BA.2 to become the main epidemic strain in the world.
According to the Shaoguan Municipal Government, due to the highly contagious nature of BA.5.1.7, a dinner party on October 1 tied many positive cases in the city to the same chain of transmission.
Li Shujian said that although the two mutant strains currently affecting Shaoguan have strong infectivity, transmissibility and immune escape ability, they all require methods such as close contact and coexistence with space to achieve transmission.
"At this stage, the purpose of taking decisive measures to strengthen epidemic prevention and control is to slow down the social operation of the main urban areas of Wujiang District and Zhenjiang District, where more cases were found, reduce crowd gathering activities, and cut off the The route of virus transmission reduces the risk of the spread of the epidemic." Li Shujian said that the current battle between Shaoguan and the epidemic is in a stalemate, and the prevention and control situation is severe and complicated; social screening found that there are still hidden cases, which brings uncertainty to the prevention and control of the epidemic in Shaoguan.
"At this stage, conducting in-depth epidemiological investigations is the most effective means to quickly control the spread of the virus." Li Shujian pointed out that regional nucleic acid screening is a powerful means to detect potentially infected persons in a timely manner. If the screening coverage is insufficient, the detection of the epidemic will be delayed. opportunity.
Among the cases now found in Shaoguan, several cases did not participate in each round of nucleic acid screening as required, further amplifying the risk of epidemic transmission.
(Finish)