A resident consults a medical worker at a fever clinic in Lianhu district of Xi'an, Northwest China's Shaanxi Province, December 21, 2022. Photo: Xinhua

China is seeing a downward trend in terms of the number of COVID-19 outpatients, severe cases and deaths in hospitals, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Chinese CDC) said in a report on COVID-19 data on Wednesday.

Notably, the latest number of infections has decreased to 24,000, deaths registered in hospitals fell to 434 on January 30 and no new variants have been found, the report said. Influenza-like cases in outpatient visits have returned to pre-pandemic levels.

It was the second release of specific COVID-19 figures by the department since the country optimized COVID-19 response measures and downgraded its management. The first one was released on January 25.

The release analyzed national data on COVID-19 infections and treatment as well as surveillance of COVID-19 strains and vaccines between December 9, 2022 and January 30, 2023.

According to the official release, COVID-19 infections across China peaked at 6.94 million on December 22 with new daily cases decreasing to 15,000 on January 23 and then rising slightly to 24,000 on January 30. The positive infection rate dropped to 2.5 percent on January 30 after it peaked at 29.2 percent on December 25.

The Chinese CDC data showed the number of outpatients, severe cases in hospital and deaths in hospital were all trending downwards.

The number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients peaked at 1.625 million on January 5, and then continued to decline to 144,000 on January 30, a 91.1 percent decrease from the peak, the data showed.

Severe hospitalized cases also saw a downward trend, according to the figures. It showed that the number of severe cases increased by nearly 10,000 per day between December 27, 2022 and January 3, but the number dropped on January 4. After the number peaked at 128,000 on January 5, it witnessed a continuous drop and fell to 14,000 on January 30.

The Chinese CDC data showed that the number of deaths in hospitals hit a daily peak of 4,273 on January 4, and declined thereafter to 434 on January 30, down 89.8 percent from the peak.

The number of deaths on January 23 was 896, meaning all provinces reported 462 deaths in seven days, according to the previous CDC report on January 25.

Data from fever clinics in cities and villages showed that the number of patients received was also trending downwards. The total number of fever patients dropped to 164,000 on January 30, down 94.3 percent from the peak of 2.86 million on December 23.

More specifically, fever clinic visits in villages and towns hit a peak of 922,000 on December 23, and fell to 69,000 on January 30; fever clinic visits in urban areas peaked on December 22 with the visits reaching 1.95 million and fell to 95,000 on January 30.

The Chinese CDC also released antigen test results from across the country, which showed a downward trend. The number fell to 132,000 on January 30 from a high of 1.89 million on December 19, 2022.

Based on data from 824 monitoring sites for influenza and 402 COVID-19 testing labs, the weekly number of influenza-like cases from September to early December 2022 remained stable at about 100,000, and reached a maximum of 600,000 in the week between December 19 and 25. The proportion of influenza-like cases to outpatient visits has fallen to 2 percent, back to pre-pandemic levels.

The monitoring data also showed that the positive rate of COVID-19 infections dropped to 8.3 percent in the week between January 23 and 29. The positive rate of influenza remained below 1 percent.

Regarding new strains, the Chinese CDC said in this round of epidemic, strains including BA.5.2.48, B.7.14 and BA.5.2.49 are still dominant and no new variants have been found.

From September 26, 2022 to January 30, a total of 20,582 valid genome sequences of COVID-19 were reported in China, all of which were Omicron variants, with a total of 73 evolutionary subbranches reported.

Global Times