(Yicai Global) July 7 -- Beijing reported zero new local Covid-19 cases for the first time in 25 days, according to the Chinese capital’s health commission.

The city had one new asymptomatic case and no new local Covid-19 cases, as against imported cases, or suspected cases yesterday, the commission said today.

Beijing has reported 335 confirmed cases and no deaths since the Xinfadi food wholesale market cluster on June 11. Some 320 Covid-19 patients are being treated in hospital, 15 have been cured and discharged, while 31 are asymptomatic and under observation. As of yesterday, the city had single-digit new cases each day for eight straight days.

The city has performed more than 11 million nucleic acid tests so far, Pang Xinghuo, deputy director of the Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said at a press conference yesterday.

That has played a vital role in the timely detection and control of infection sources and effective curbing of the chain of virus transmission as well as the spread of the pandemic, Pang said.

Before the cluster at Xinfadi, Asia's busiest agricultural wholesale market, Beijing had had no new local cases for 56 days in a row. The virus found in Xinfadi is a branch I of the European family of the L genotype, which ruled out the possibility of the local strain or Wuhan strain being the cause of the outbreak, according to the latest survey by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

Beijing has strengthened control over population movement after the Xinfadi cluster, restricting people from high-risk regions from leaving, and requiring others to show a negative test certificate within seven days before exiting the city.

With the epidemic gradually under control, people from low-risk regions have no longer been required to carry test results since July 4. But strict control measures are still in place in high- and medium-risk areas.

Editor: Dou Shicong