There were 9 new cases of indigenous infection in 5 days, and the epidemic in Beijing involved multiple chains of transmission

Beijing, which is about to usher in the Winter Olympics, has seen a rise in the epidemic in recent days.

Since January 15, in just five days, Beijing has accumulated 9 cases of indigenous infection, involving the Delta and Omilon variants, and the epidemic situation is grim.

Among them, there were 5 new positive cases in Beijing on the 19th. According to Liu Xiaofeng, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention, among the 5 new positive personnel, 4 are cold storage stevedores of the same unit, and the other 1 is a close connection with the same unit, engaged in cold storage loading and unloading work, and 3 people have detected the specific mutation site of the Delta variant strain.

Of the 5 people, 2 are currently living in Changyang Town, a mountainous area, and 3 are currently living in Wanliuyuan Community in Fengtai District. At present, epidemiological investigations and close contact tracing have been carried out, the risk points involved have been investigated, and various types of risk personnel have been classified and controlled.

So far, the local epidemic in Beijing has affected the four districts of Haidian, Chaoyang, Fangshan and Fengtai, and involves multiple sources of transmission.

A domestic virology expert analyzed China Newsweek, "As far as the information released so far, the source of infection of these 5 people should come from the cold storage where they work." It is likely that one of them was 'tricked' first and then passed on to the others. ”

All new cases are associated with the same cold storage

According to the press conference on the epidemic situation, the positive infection case 1 is now in the dormitory of Unit No. 8, North Guangyangcheng Street, Changyang Town, Changyang Town, Housing MountainOus District. The case reported that he developed cough symptoms on 17 January, took his own medication, and did not seek medical attention. On January 19, the nucleic acid test result was reported to be abnormal, and the Fangshan District CDC immediately re-collected its specimen for nucleic acid testing, and the result was positive. The Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention detected the specific mutation site of the Delta strain.

Judging from the published circulation information, positive infection case 2 lives with case 1; cases 3, 4 and 5 all live in a unit of Building 18, Wanliuyuan Community in Fengtai District, and 3 people live together.

According to the residence of the person with positive nucleic acid test, Buildings 18 and 15 of Wanliuyuan Community are sealed and controlled areas, the 7 buildings around the sealing and control area and the places involved in the action trajectory are designated as control areas, and other buildings in Wanliuyuan Community are designated as prevention areas.

It is worth noting that 4 of the 5 positive cases were found in the weekly routine nucleic acid test screening of cold chain practitioners.

Lu Chenfei, executive deputy governor of Fangshan District, said at the press conference that on January 19, Fangshan District twice received reports from third-party testing agencies and found that 2 nucleic acid test mixed samples were positive, and 2 samples belonged to the same batch of samples from the same enterprise.

The two people said that they had not left Beijing in the past 14 days, and both were stevedores and unloaders, both living in the collective dormitory in the courtyard of the epidemic-related enterprise, in the same room.

The 5 new positive cases all point to a cold storage leasing enterprise, which is an independent small hospital and has been sealed. According to the press conference, the epidemic-related enterprise is located at No. 8, North Guangyangcheng Street, Changyang Town, Fangshan District, with 9 employees and 67 tenants, of which 25 are involved in import business.

If the source of infection of these 5 positive cases is cold storage, it is not yet known where the items loaded and unloaded by these workers have flowed in the recent period and whether they have spread to new environments or other people.

The aforementioned virology experts point out that this possibility exists, but the probability of it happening is very low. Unless the social activities of these infected people are very active and closely related to many people. Otherwise, the virus is unlikely to spread widely through cold storage.

In his view, it is not easy to say whether there will be new cases in the future. However, from the available information, these 5 infected people belong to a "collection", so there is no need to be overly nervous.

Multi-source transmission occurs

Recently, the domestic epidemic situation has been sporadic at many points, and according to the published circulation situation, some of them have come from relatively independent overseas imports. The same is true of this round of the epidemic in Beijing.

Before the emergence of these five infected people, on January 15, the first confirmed case of Aomi Kerong appeared in Beijing. After intensive flow analysis and genetic sequencing, it was confirmed that the case had no history of contact with high-risk people and no record of emigration, and that the infection of the Omilon strain was close to that of the Omilon strain currently prevalent in North America and Singapore.

The case received an international mail message on 11 January, which was sent from Canada on the 7th, passing through the United States and Hong Kong, China. Pang Xinghuo, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention, pointed out that combined with the epidemiological history of the case, the detection results of the suspicious item sample and the genetic sequencing results of the case specimen, the possibility of infecting the virus through overseas items is not excluded. In other words, the epidemic in Beijing's Aomi Kerong may be related to international mail.

At present, this case of Omiljung has caused 2 associated confirmed cases, all of whom are close contacts, 1 is his mother and 1 is a colleague on the same floor of his unit.

It is worth noting that on the 18th, there was also a new case of positive infection. The new case, who lives in Shigezhuang Village, Pingfang Township, Chaoyang District, came to Beijing in November 2021 to work as a migrant worker, mainly engaged in the handling of decoration materials. After being tested positive for nucleic acid, the patient was controlled on the G1085 train to Weihai and has now been transferred to a designated hospital in Beijing for isolation treatment.

According to Yang Beibei, deputy mayor of Chaoyang District, after further examination and expert consultation, the case was diagnosed as an asymptomatic infected person with new coronavirus.

The aforementioned virologist pointed out that this chain of transmission in Haidian District currently seems to be at a small risk of spreading, but the new positive case in Chaoyang District deserves vigilance and needs to be identified as soon as possible.

"It is not excluded that it is a new imported epidemic from abroad." Zhang Yu, an associate researcher at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, analyzed that at present, the source of the epidemic in Chaoyang District is still under investigation, and there must be other infected people around it, but it should not produce too much.