(TibetanReview.net, Aug10’22) – Seven people have tested Covid-19 positive on Aug 9 in Ngari prefecture and Shigatse city, reported China’s official chinadaily.com.cn Aug 10, taking the officially reported total in Tibet autonomous region (TAR) in the current outbreak to 29. Five are from Shigatse－two confirmed and three asymptomatic – while the other two are from Ngari’s Purang (Chinese: Burang) County, both asymptomatic.
As of Aug 9 evening, TAR had four confirmed cases and 25 asymptomatic infections, breaking its 920-day infection-free streak, said a chinadaily.com.cn report Aug 9.
Three makeshift hospitals had been set up in the cities of Lhasa (built at a sports centre), Shigatse (Chinese: Xigaze) and Chamdo (Qamdo) to accommodate asymptomatic carriers of Covid-19 and those with mild symptoms, reported the country’s official Xinhua news agency Aug 10.
The 18 people who tested positive on Aug 7 in Lhasa had the highly contagious transmissible Omicron variant, said the chinadaily.com.cn report Aug 9.
The first confirmed patient, surnamed Dan, was stated to be a 3-year-old who had travelled from Shigatse City to Lhasa by train with his mother and grandmother on Aug 4.
“All 18 patients have been hospitalized. They are in stable condition, without obvious discomfort, and in a good psychological condition,” Yan Zhouzhong, the deputy director of Lhasa’s health commission, has said.
The city has seven designated quarantine hotels, with 119 relatives of the first confirmed case put under quarantine to curb the spread of the virus.
Both Lhasa and Shigatse were conducting a fresh round of mass testing on Aug 9, and the second round begins today, the CNA news agency Aug 10 cited China’s state television as saying.
And in Tibet’s western Ngari prefecture, a sparsely populated region that attracted many pilgrims to Mount Kailash, three towns started three rounds of mass testing, while the rest have started on their first, state television was further cited as saying.