People view blooming flowers at the Beijing Ming Dynasty City Wall Relics Park in Beijing, capital of China, March 26, 2022. Photo:Xinhua

Ahead of the Labor Day holidays on May 1, the Beijing municipal government issued a notice on Monday encouraging local residents to avoid travel and stay put during the holidays, as the travel rush could increase the risk of accelerating virus transmission.

All residents in Beijing are being encouraged to cancel nonessential trips and not to leave the city unless necessary during the upcoming holidays. They were also reminded not to attend large gatherings, and to wear masks and maintain social distancing in crowded public venues, the Beijing health authorities said at a press conference on Monday.

It comes as several cities have seen a resurgence of the COVID-19 outbreak. Surging local cases in East China's Shanghai and Northeast China's Jilin pose increasing uncertainties for overall anti-epidemic work nationwide. A total of five new local COVID-19 cases have been reported in Beijing since Sunday.

Xu Hejian, spokesperson for the Beijing municipal government, said on Monday that the health authorities would strengthen the control of people at potential risk of infection in order to quickly and resolutely stop the spread of the virus.

Amid the latest COVID-19 spike, Beijing requires people returning from outside the city to provide a nucleic acid testing result within 48 hours, read the notice.

The spokesperson also noted that indoor public places such as performance venues, entertainment venues, stadiums, internet cafes, cinemas, libraries, museums and art galleries will be open to the public at a 75 percent capacity limit during the holiday.

"Staying put" during the Labor Day holidays will become the choice of most residents across the country, with people likely to stay within their province or city, according to media reports.

Chang Rongshan, a virologist at Shantou University, said in an interview that Omicron is 10 times more difficult to control than the Delta variant. Therefore, given the increasing difficulty of prevention and control, the probability of completely free inter-provincial travel during the upcoming holiday is not too high.

Global Times