Tourists take nucleic acid tests at Shanghai Hongqiao Railway Station on December 1, 2022. Photo: IC

Negative nucleic acid test results are not required to take public transportation and entering outdoor public venues such as parks and scenic spots in Shanghai since Monday, local authority announced on Sunday. 

The city's epidemic prevention and control work group released the latest policies on the official WeChat account as part of a series of optimized and adjusted measures in response to the 20 optimized measures to fight the COVID-19 epidemic in mid-November. 

According to the measures, negative nucleic acid test results will not be required when taking public transportation within the city such as metro, buses and ferries since Monday. 

Besides, the negative results will also not be required for visitors of outdoor public venues such as parks and scenic spots. 

The city will continue to optimize and adjust relevant prevention and control measures according to the national policies and the epidemic situation, the authority noted, reminding local residents to continue to adhering to social distancing and other relevant personal protection measures. 

However, in terms of indoor public venues such as restaurants and shopping malls, supermarkets, wet markets and beauty salons and public bathing places, negative nucleic acid test results obtained within 48 hours still have to be presented. 

The number of new infections in Shanghai has been increasing over the past few days with the registered new infections on a single day reaching 486 on Saturday, including 36 confirmed patients and 450 asymptomatic carriers, according to the local health commission. A total of 11 confirmed patients and three silent carriers were discovered at community level.

Apart from Shanghai, a number of places across China have further optimized and adjusted COVID-19 epidemic prevention and control measures in variety of aspects involving transportation, medical service and nucleic acid testing over the past few days. 

Public transportation operators in Beijing such as buses, metros are prohibited to reject passengers without negative nucleic acid test results obtained within 48 hours since Monday. 

The Beijing Municipal Health Commission said on Thursday that hospitals in Beijing shall not reject patients without negative nucleic acid test results taken within 48 hours. Nucleic acid test results are also not required for patients under 3 years old and medical institutions shall not refuse treatment or delay treatment for critically ill patients due to the absence of the results. 

In Shenzhen, South China's Guangdong Province, nucleic acid test results are not required to take public transportation such as buses, metros and taxis since Saturday. 

Similar optimized measures have also been adopted in Southwest China's Chongqing and Sichuan and North China's Tianjin. Wuhan in Central China's Hubei Province will also stop checking nucleic acid test results in metros and passengers can take metros with green health codes.

Lhasa in Southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region has gradually resumed public transportation within the city since Sunday to meet the local residents' needs for going out. 

Global Times