Universities reminded to maintain COVID-19 vigilance amid outbreaks

China's top education authorities have reminded universities to fully implement COVID-19 epidemic containment measures and make contingency plans as students and faculty head home for the winter break.

Wang Dengfeng, head of the Ministry of Education's department of physical, health and arts education, said over the weekend that given the rise of sporadic cases and cluster infections in different regions, universities must strictly abide by epidemic prevention and control measures for health management and activities on and off campuses.

They should also conduct emergency drills in case of an outbreak, Wang said at a news conference on Saturday.

Implementing COVID-19 epidemic containment measures will help prevent outbreaks on campuses, while the emergency plans are meant to ensure universities can minimize the impact if an outbreak occurs, he said.

Universities should repeatedly remind students and faculty members to adhere to COVID-19 epidemic containment measures on their way home, Wang said.

They are also required to conduct regular health monitoring and make timely reports on anyone expressing physical discomfort during the holiday, he said.

Recent outbreaks in different regions have involved students. In response, the ministry has sent working teams to Shaanxi and Henan provinces and Tianjin to guide local education authorities in epidemic control and prevention, Wang said.

Tianjin has suspended offline tutoring courses since Jan 8, and all its schools and universities have been closed for the winter break since Jan 12 to minimize gatherings and risks of COVID-19 transmission.

All schools in the city have shuttered their campuses, and students who have left the city for the winter holidays have received notices telling them to undergo nucleic acid tests, he added.

Ren Qianyuan, a senior at Beijing Foreign Studies University, said the university has tightened its epidemic prevention and control measures since Beijing reported a locally transmitted COVID-19 case on Saturday.

Students can only leave campus if absolutely necessary, and they need to first get approval from counselors, he said. The measures led him to move his internship online.

"The stricter measures have brought some inconvenience to me, but it does not bother me too much, and I know they are being carried out to safeguard our safety," Ren said.

Zhai Ziqi, another undergraduate student at the university, said while most of its students have returned home, she stayed as she is a volunteer for the upcoming Olympic Winter Games.

"The Omicron variant seems more transmissible and more difficult to contain than others," she said. "I understand why the university has taken tougher measures, and we need to stay vigilant for possible outbreaks."