Thanks to stringent epidemic prevention and control measures and workers heeding the call from the authorities to stay in the cities where they work rather than returning to their hometowns, the reemergence of the novel coronavirus seems to have been basically checked on the Chinese mainland.

The National Health Commission on Wednesday reported only seven new COVID-19 cases, all imported, in the past 24 hours, with near zero locally transmitted cases reported for a dozen days.

All this paves the way for economic activities and social life to quickly return to normal nationwide after epidemic responses were upgraded in many places including Hebei province and Beijing in mid-December following the detection of non-imported infections.

Now with the Lunar New Year holiday coming to an end and people who returned home for family reunions on their way back to work, a travel peak can be anticipated. More than 17.45 million people were reported to be on water, air, rail and road travel on Tuesday, compared with 14.8 million the day before, which poses a new challenge to the anti-epidemic work.

Public health officials and workers must maintain a balance between remaining on high alert to the emergence of any new cases and ensuring smooth journeys for travelers.

While it is still necessary to maintain some of the rigid anti-pandemic rules — such as requiring those from high-risk areas to take nucleic acid tests and up to 14 days of quarantine — it is equally important to make sure the list of high-risk areas is updated to avoid unnecessary restrictions on people from previously affected areas.

Special attention should be paid to "lazy governance" by some local officials who seek to accelerate anti-epidemic measures "level by level" at the expense of public health resources and the interests of individuals.

Given that there are only three high-risk and five medium-risk areas nationwide — most of them in Heilongjiang province — officials at all levels should shift the emphasis of their work to ensuring smooth and quick resumption of economic activities and social life with the help of scientific and targeted anti-epidemic measures.

Besides, there should be no let-up in the implementation of previously proved effective measures such as face mask wearing, social distancing and disinfection of public transport vehicles to keep the chance of new infections at the minimum.

All this, in addition to the gradual rollout of vaccines, will keep the country in an advantageous position in the long-term fight against the virus.

The author contributed this article to China Watch exclusively. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of China Watch.

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