China officially reports first COVID-19 deaths in weeks as doubts gather over official count - CNA

The NHC reported 1,995 symptomatic infections for Dec 18, compared with 2,097 a day earlier.

But infection rates have also become an unreliable guide as far less mandatory PCR testing is being conducted following the recent easing. The NHC stopped reporting asymptomatic cases last week citing the testing drop.

China's stocks fell and the yuan eased against the dollar on Monday, as investors grew concerned that surging COVID-19 cases would further weigh on the world's second-largest economy despite pledges of government support.

The virus was also sweeping through trading floors in Beijing and spreading fast in the financial hub of Shanghai, with illness and absence thinning already light trade and forcing regulators to cancel a weekly meeting vetting public share sales.

Japanese chipmaker Renesas Electronics Corp said on Monday it had suspended work at its Beijing plant due to COVID-19 infections.

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China's chief epidemiologist Wu Zunyou on Saturday said the country was in the throes of the first of three COVID-19 waves expected this winter, which was more in line with what people said they are experiencing on the ground.

"I'd say 60 to 70 per cent of my colleagues ... are infected right now," Liu, a 37-year-old university canteen worker in Beijing, told Reuters, requesting to be identified by his surname.

While top officials have been downplaying the threat posed by the new Omicron strain of the virus in recent weeks, authorities remain concerned about the elderly, who have been reluctant to get vaccinated.

Officially, China's vaccination rate is above 90 per cent, but the rate for adults who have received booster doses of the vaccine drops to 57.9 per cent, and to 42.3 per cent for people aged 80 and above, according to government data.

In the Shijingshan district of Beijing, medical workers have been going door-to-door offering to vaccinate elderly residents in their homes, China's Xinhua news agency reported on Sunday.

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2022-12-19 07:46:18Z
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