Shanghai – Authorities in Beijing have
temporarily shut a major wholesale agricultural market following
a rise in locally transmitted novel coronavirus infections in
China's capital city over the past two days.
The closure of the Xinfadi wholesale market at 3am on Saturday came after two men
working at a meat research centre who had recently visited the
market were reported on Friday as having been infected by the
novel coronavirus. It was not immediately clear how the men had
been infected.
Concern is growing of a second wave of the new virus, even
in many countries that seemed to have curbed its spread. It was
first reported at a seafood market in Wuhan, the capital of
central China's Hubei province, in December.
Beijing authorities had earlier halted beef and mutton
trading at the Xinfadi market, alongside closures at other
wholesale markets around the city.
Reflecting concerns over the risk of further spread of the
virus, major supermarkets in Beijing removed salmon from their
shelves overnight after the virus causing Covid-19 was
discovered on chopping boards used for imported salmon at the
market, the state-owned Beijing Youth Daily reported.
Beijing authorities said more than 10 000 people at the
market will take nucleic acid tests to detect coronavirus
infections. The city government also said it had dropped plans
to reopen schools on Monday for students in grades 1 and 3 because of the new cases.
Health authorities visited the home of a Reuters reporter in
Beijing's Dongcheng district on Saturday to ask whether she had
visited the Xinfadi market, which is 15km away. They
said the visit was part of patrols Dongcheng was conducting.
China reported 11 new Covid-19 cases and seven asymptomatic
cases on Friday, the national health authority said on
Saturday. All six locally transmitted cases were confirmed
in Beijing.