DELHI, NEW DELHI: As China confronts its largest outbreak since the virus first surfaced there in late 2019, the fast-spreading Delta version appears to have broken through Covid defences.
China reported the largest daily number of local coronavirus cases in months on Wednesday, with 71. Since July 30, the number of new cases has been rising for five days in a row.
Since late July, the highly transmissible Delta form, which was first discovered in India, has been detected in over a dozen Chinese cities, including the capital Beijing.
Between July 20 and August 3, China reported 485 locally transmitted cases with symptoms, however it's unclear how many of these are the Delta form.
As of early Wednesday, 17 provinces, regions, and municipalities have reported both symptomatic and asymptomatic locally transmitted cases.
Due to the quick and asymptomatic spread of the Delta type, Chinese officials agree that containing the latest outbreak will be far more difficult than the previous.
In mid-July, the first Delta infection arrived in Nanjing, China, during an international flight from Moscow.
On the flight, seven persons were infected with the variation. It then spread to a group of airport cleaning employees, with nine of them testing positive for the virus on July 20.
Their diseases immediately spread among those who entered the airport, which serves as a key traffic centre.
Cases appeared as far away as Hainan Island in China's south, 1,900 kilometres (1,180 miles) from Nanjing, in just a few weeks.