A medical worker collects a sample from a local resident in Ruili, Southwest China's Yunnan Province, for a nucleic acid test on Tuesday as the city launched a second round of mass testing. Photo:Xinhua
Gong Yunzun, Party chief of Ruili, Southwest China's Yunnan Province, has been dismissed from his post for serious negligence in epidemic control in the city, where a total of 76 local confirmed cases and 25 asymptomatic patients have been reported as of Thursday.
The decision was made by provincial discipline inspection authorities after an investigation, reported Yunnan Daily on Thursday.
Gong, 46, took the main leadership responsibility for the outbreaks in Ruili, which occurred three times in succession over more than half a year, especially the recent flareups since March 29, severely damaging the overall situation of national and provincial epidemic prevention and control work, said the report.
Gong took the post of Party Committee Secretary of Ruili in April 2018. He has now been demoted to a first-level researcher.
Ruili reported 11 new confirmed cases and one silent carrier on Thursday, bringing the total local infection numbers to 76 and 25 respectively.
The China-Myanmar border city was put under the spotlight after new COVID-19 cases were found on March 29, six months after a wave of cases hit the city in September 2020.
With a population of 300,000, Ruili has launched two rounds of citywide nucleic acid testing, with the most recent one conducted on Tuesday.
As of 6 pm on Wednesday, about 354,000 samples were collected, of which 186,000 were tested, said the authority at a press conference.
It also rolled out a mass vaccination drive across the city on Friday, which was temporarily suspended on Tuesday due to the mass testing.
Amid the outbreak, Ruili raised three neighborhoods to COVID-19 high-risk areas and six others to medium risk on Monday, breaking the 42-day streak after China cleared all medium- and high-risk areas on February 22.
Global Times