Yellow Code for Untested Residents
If your Health code turned yellow today, no need to panic. Late last night the city government announced that from 6 pm today, residents in Shanghai who have had no PCR test record since March 16 will see their health code turn yellow. So, an easy fix to get your green code back is to get tested. SmartShanghai has a list of Covid test locations here, and we wrote a detailed guide on how to get tested at home here.
Self Test Kits Are Being used in Compounds
Most districts have started distributing self-testing kits to compounds and asking residents to test themselves. The self-testing kits will be distributed free of charge by the local neighborhood committee (居委会 jū wěi hu), so you may have someone knocking at your door handing you a bunch of free kits this weekend.
If your test is negative, you should throw them away. If the test is positive you are required to notify your neighborhood committee. If you don't have a contact for your neighborhood committee, ask your landlord or call the city's hotline 12345 (extension 7 for English).
It's also mentioned that if you test negative but have symptoms such as fever, you should go to the next fever clinic or self-quarantine at home and test yourself five times. See below on how to locate Fever Clinics in your area, or call the city's hotline 12345 (extension 7 for English).
We did some research after seeing warnings on WeChat groups not to drink any alcohol before testing and came across a research paper that indicates that soft drinks and alcohol might create false-positive test results. So better be sober before getting tested. You can read more about the Self Kits and how to purchase them yourself here.
Does Omicron have a shorter incubation period?
Reading through yesterday's press conference we found this interesting piece of information: In 2020 Covid RO Value (an indicator of how many people one infected person would infect on average) was 2.5 to 3, while Omicron has an RO Value of 9.5, so it's A LOT more infectious. We sort of knew that already. The next line is what's so interesting: The incubation period is shortened and is now usually just 3 days. 3 days! So, if it's only 3 days, does this mean quarantine for inbound travelers wouldn't need to be 14 days anymore? Pure speculation, but we do see quarantine times being shortened in various cases, so maybe we can expect some adjustments to quarantine times in the future.
Hospital Closures
A bunch of hospitals are currently closed, including all of Parkway Clinics locations and Jiahui Hospital's main campus (as of March 26). The case of a nurse that has died after not having received timely help due to a local hospital being closed has made waves, and the Shanghai government responded acknowledging that better procedures might have to be implemented to make sure hospitals don't have to close down for an unnecessary amount of time. Just this morning they announced that less hospital closures are to be expected now. If you need to visit a hospital, we recommend you call the city's hotline 12345 to verify that the hospital of your choice is currently open. Another way is to check in WeChat's MiniProgram. Search for "随申办" or click below, then follow the steps on the pictures.
门急诊 is Emergency Department, 发热门诊 is fever clinic.
Is the End in Sight?
Let's finish this with some positiveness. "The exponential growth of Shanghai's new COVID-19 cases has stopped under the current prevention strategies, such as rolling-type screening, the city's top coronavirus expert said on Friday." Today's numbers show that indeed downtown Shanghai has fewer cases compared to a few days before, while most of the cases are now in Pudong and Minhang. Don't forget to wear your masks outside and stay safe Shanghai.
