Three and a half weeks before the start of the Olympic Winter Games in Beijing, another Chinese metropolis has gone into lockdown.
On Monday evening, the five million residents of the city of Anyang, 500 kilometers southwest of the Olympic city, were asked not to leave their homes until further notice.
This was reported by the state news agency Xinhua.
China, which has a zero covid strategy, reported 110 new local corona cases on Tuesday.
Shortly before Christmas, Xi'an in the north of the country (over 13 million inhabitants) was cordoned off, in the previous week Yuzhou (1.1).
Hong Kong, which already has some of the strictest coronavirus border restrictions in the world, also tightened its restrictions on Tuesday to fight an omicron outbreak, closing kindergartens and elementary schools through early February.
China will host the Olympic Games (February 4th to 20th) in a "closed loop" designed to ensure that neither athletes nor other participants come into contact with the public.
The authorities closed the cycle in the previous week, so that thousands of employees, volunteers, cleaners, cooks and bus drivers will be shielded from the outside world for weeks.
Olympic athletes in the bladder
Around 3,000 athletes and media representatives from all over the world will arrive in the Chinese capital in the coming weeks and will remain in the protection zone from landing to departure.
Anyone entering the bladder must be fully vaccinated or undergo a 21-day quarantine on landing.
Anyone who is in the bladder is tested daily and must wear a face mask.
The system includes special means of transport between the venues, with even closed high-speed rail systems operating in parallel with those open to the public.