Chinese city of Qingdao punishes two officials over coronavirus cluster

The Chinese city of Qingdao said on Thursday it had suspended its health commission head and sacked a hospital director following an outbreak of coronavirus infections that ended China's run of about two months without reporting a local case. The coastal city has reported 13 recent infections, most of them linked to the Qingdao Chest Hospital, where infected travellers arriving from overseas had been treated in an isolation area.

The Chinese city of Qingdao said on Thursday it had suspended its health commission head and sacked a hospital director following an outbreak of coronavirus infections that ended China's run of about two months without reporting a local case.

The coastal city has reported 13 recent infections, most of them linked to the Qingdao Chest Hospital, where infected travellers arriving from overseas had been treated in an isolation area. One of the cases involved a dock worker who had earlier tested positive for the virus but only developed symptoms after about 20 days, the city said.

Qingdao announced this week that it would test all of its 9 million residents for the virus over a five-day period. More than 7 million results had come back as of Thursday morning, with no infections beyond those reported, it said. The novel coronavirus first emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year.

After early missteps, China has taken aggressive measures to curb its spread, including mass testing campaigns when clusters appear, and has managed to nearly stamp out domestic transmission. The total number of confirmed novel coronavirus cases in mainland China stands at 85,622, with 4,634 deaths.

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