Shanghai punishes officials for mismanaging hotel quarantine

The result of an investigation into the COVID-19 outbreak related to Huating Hotel, a quarantine hotel in Shanghai's Xuhui district, was released on Saturday and more than a dozen officials were punished for mismanagement and negligence.

The hotel, which was designated a quarantine facility on Feb 21, reported its first positive infections on March 2, beginning the latest COVID-19 epidemic wave in Shanghai. The hotel, which was classified as a medium-risk area between March 5 and 20, registered a total of 62 infections.

The investigation found institutional loopholes in the management of the quarantine hotel by the Xuhui district Party committee, district government, health commission and civil affairs bureau as well as Xujiahui subdistrict government.

Two vice-governors of Xuhui, Gao Tian and Fang Lei, the deputy director of district health commission Ren Xuelei, and the director of district civil affairs bureau Guo Yanmei were removed from their posts. The district Party chief Cao Liqiang was asked to write a self-criticism, and the governor of Xuhui district Zhong Xiaoyong was issued an internal warning by the Party.

Related leaders and officials failed to fulfill their duties on epidemic control, it said, and problems, such as neglect of close-looped management and self-monitoring being a mere formality, led to the infection of quarantine workers within the facility with serious consequences.