Harbin, a major city in north-eastern China has adopted a draconian quarantine measures against COVID-19 after a new outbreak was detected there. It is believed that the virus was "imported" by a student coming home from New York, according to media reports.
More than 70 people are now infected with the virus and authorities are testing 4,000 people in Harbin who are believed to come in contact with the positive cases. Gatherings are now banned and communities are ordered to closely monitor non-local visitors and vehicles in the city with approximately 10 million residents.
Guidelines for the Chinese city under lockdown
The news came just after China has announced today that the former center of the pandemic, City of Wuhan, has only two critically ill patients left and less than 1,000 confirmed patients. Half of those who contracted the virus from abroad have already recovered, said the health authorities on Thursday in a press conference.
Now, the capital of Heilongjiang, Harbin, has been grappling in facing the country's biggest coronavirus outbreak now, according to a report from the Daily Mail.
A directive from the government has already been released yesterday. To instruct further restrictions on its residents, visitors, and inbound traffic.
Residents are required to use a government-approved health app to prove that they do not have the virus, and they also need their temperature to be taken and wear a face mask before they can enter any public facilities and residential complexes.
Furthermore, social gatherings such as weddings, funerals, public performances, and conferences are already banned. This is to promote social-distancing measures in the city.
People who have been in close contact with confirmed, suspected, and asymptomatic individuals will be put into strict quarantine. As well as their neighbors in the same building must also isolate themselves at home for at least two weeks with around-the-clock surveillance.
Although asymptomatic, these type of cases still need to undergo quarantine as they carry the virus and could infect other people. Those people under home quarantine must undergo two nucleic acid tests; one is to detect the presence of the virus, and the second one is the anti-body test which shows if the person has had the virus in the past.
Stricter rules for all overseas arrivals
Harbin, the biggest city of Heilongjiang, has already ordered that visitors arriving outside of China or key epidemic areas must undergo isolation first for 28 days. Heilongjiang has been at the forefront of the country's latest efforts in identifying people with coronavirus coming from Russia, with which China has been sharing a border, to stop the virus from spreading.
Sun, not her real name, a 34-year old Harbin resident, said that he will no longer take neither his daughter nor her grandmother out anymore. If they need food, she would instead send her husband to buy for them on his way back.
She will also impose strict rules for those who will go out of their house to leave their shoes outside the door to avoid bringing in the virus to their house.
