Covid-19: China records its first two deaths in more than a year

Medical personnel prepare Covid-19 tests in the city of Jilin in China on March 12, 2022. AFP - STR

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Mainland China recorded its first two deaths from Covid-19 in more than a year on Saturday March 19, underscoring the threat posed to the country by the Omicron variant, already responsible for the largest wave of contamination since the start of the pandemic. pandemic.

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The two deaths occurred in Jilin (in the northeast of the country), the province most affected by the current wave, said the National Health Commission.

Authorities recorded 4,051 new infections across the country on Saturday, and 4,365 the day before, more than half of them in Jilin province.

These are the first deaths reported since January 26, 2021 in mainland China, excluding Hong Kong and Macau.

They bring the toll of the pandemic to 4,638 dead, while

Hong Kong

, also in the grip of a resurgence of

Covid-19

, deplores more than 200 deaths per day.

►

To read also

: in Hong Kong, the sending of caregivers from China sparks debate

An epidemic hitherto kept under control

China, where the first cases of coronavirus appeared at the end of 2019, had kept the epidemic under control thanks to strict border controls, long quarantines, massive screening campaigns and targeted confinements as still recently since

some 100 million Chinese

are asked to stay at home or limit their movements.

President Xi this week reaffirmed his

“zero Covid” strategy,

undermined with the arrival of the Omicron variant.

A so-called dynamic zero-Covid strategy with case-by-case adaptation, intended to avoid the total containment measures taken at the start of the epidemic.

The commission recommends four new directions in its epidemic prevention strategy.


1. Mild cases need to be isolated centrally (quarantine hotel), but no longer need to be hospitalized.

pic.twitter.com/zLLeh7ZHJ1

— Stephane Lagarde (@StephaneLagarde) March 16, 2022

In recent weeks, official sources have suggested that China may at some point have to live with Covid-19, as other countries do, and have worried about the impact of broad lockdowns on the economy.

►

To read: Covid-19: rebound of the pandemic in Asia as health measures are relaxed

(and with

AFP

)

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