Fever clinic patient number decreasing

The number of patients that fever clinics across China received is dropping, an official from the national health authority said on Saturday.

Jiao Yahui, head of the National Health Commission's medical administration bureau, told a news conference that the figure of fever clinic visits across the country decreased to 470,000 on Thursday from the peak - 2.87 million on Dec 23.

"The decline has been seen in both urban and rural areas," she said.

She revealed that the detection rate of COVID-19 positive cases at fever clinics has also been dropping steadily, peaking at 33.9 percent on Dec 20 and falling to 10.8 percent on Thursday.

In addition, the number of patients being hospitalized for COVID-19 infections has decreased to 1.27 million on Thursday from 1.62 million on Jan 5, she added.