Chinese capital city Beijing’s COVID response remains in flux as new requirements are coming up quickly in an effort to nullify the threat of potential virus spread during upcoming Chinese New Year and safe conduct of the politically important ‘Two Sessions’ in early March. 

The Beijing government said on Friday that the city will conduct serum antibody tests for all inbound overseas travelers who have entered Beijing since December 10 to find out the transmission chain in the latest cluster infections in the capital’s Daxing district. 

City health authority said a highly transmissible strain of the novel coronavirus first detected in the UK was found in two patients in Daxing, raising concerns. Chinese health experts said antibody tests for inbound travelers revealed that the epidemic in Daxing district has lasted for about one month before the first case was reported on Sunday, and nucleic acid testing won’t work in finding out the first patient. 

Meanwhile, all schools in Beijing will move to online classes from 25th January which is expected to continue till at least end of February. Beijing has already implemented 28 days of quarantine and health monitoring for all inbound travelers from overseas. 

Beijing announced it would conduct nucleic acid testing for all residents in Dongcheng and Xicheng districts on Friday, and Daxing and Shunyi districts have finished their testing. China is also targeting to inoculate 50 million people ahead of Chinese New Year. The country at present is battling its biggest COVID-19 outbreak since March 2020 with many locally transmitted cases detected in many provinces.