Beijing lifts last community lockdown after epidemic control efforts pay off

Beijing lifted the lockdowns of its last at-risk residential community on Tuesday, after the latest round of COVID-19 infections in the city was fully contained, a senior official said.

"Beijing has swiftly cut the transmission of the epidemic during this round of the outbreak," Pang Xinghuo, deputy head of the Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said at a news conference on Tuesday. The city has not reported any new locally transmitted cases since Aug 11.

Beijing has lifted lockdowns of 21 residential communities. The last one－Guofeng residential community－opened its gates to allow its residents out at 12.01 am on Tuesday.

"We have finally achieved success after a difficult 21 days of hard work during the lockdown," Cui Ning, a social worker and resident of the community, told Beijing Youth Daily. She went out of the community with her husband Zhang Xuefei, who has been doing volunteer work during the lockdown.

A middle-aged woman left the community as the gates opened in the early hours, and expressed her gratitude to community workers who made every effort to ensure people's daily needs were met during the lockdown.

"I'm eager to hang out with my classmates," a middle school boy said in a video interview with Beijing News on Tuesday morning.

However, some control and prevention measures will continue at the community. Residents will need to use passes to go in and out of the community and their health will be monitored for a week.

Beijing saw a resurgence of COVID-19 cases on July 28, after one confirmed locally transmitted case was reported.

The Beijing Education Commission announced earlier that schools will start the new semester in September as scheduled. All teachers and students at colleges should have negative nucleic acid test reports within 48 hours of returning to campus.

Zhang Boli, president of Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, on Monday told Health Times, that it's possible the epidemic may be fully under control on the Chinese mainland before the end of this month.

"The Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holidays are coming soon and the public has expressed its desire to travel during the holidays," he said. "It will be possible to go out, as long as the prevention and control measures are strictly followed."

The mainland on Monday reported one new locally transmitted confirmed COVID-19 case in Henan province, the National Health Commission said in its daily report on Tuesday.