Currently, the COVID-19 epidemic will mostly affect the group that has not been infected yet, which accounts for about 15 to 20 percent of the total population in China, said Professor Lu Mengji from the Institute for Virology of the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany on Sunday.
Li Dongzeng, chief physician at Beijing YouAn Hospital's infectious disease department, spoke with Beijing Daily about the infectiousness and virulence of the Omicron variant BF.7, the dominant subvariant in the latest outbreak of COVID-19 in Beijing. The medical expert provided advice on how residents should protect themselves from the virus in a scientific and rational way.
Several Chinese cities including Beijing, Guangzhou, Chongqing and Zhengzhou have further optimized their anti-COVID-19 measures with some places allowing residents without social activities to be free from mass testing. It is a move to take more targeted, science-based actions to curb flare-ups, as the country reported daily new cases of more than 30,000 in the past week.