Slight easing in Shanghai’s Covid-19 child separation rules, sources say

[Hamartia Antidote]

Slight easing in Shanghai’s Covid-19 child separation rules, sources say

Hospital executives say a small number of Covid-negative parents allowed to be with their young children in quarantine facilities.

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• Hospital executives say a small number of Covid-negative parents allowed to be with their young children in quarantine facilities
• The city’s hardline policy on barring the parents has come in for harsh criticism

Footage emerged on the weekend of young children isolated in state-run wards at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centre. Photo: Twitter

Shanghai has eased a previously hardline rule on separating Covid-positive children from their parents, allowing some families who meet strict requirements to stay together at a temporary hospital.

A small number of parents who test negative for the coronavirus will be allowed to accompany their Covid-positive children up to seven years old at a temporary hospital, or fangcang, at the Shanghai New International Expo Centre, according to two senior executives at top public hospitals in the city.

The easing came just one day after Shanghai announced that all Covid-19 patients, from babies to the elderly, had to be isolated in accordance with the mainland’s antivirus laws and regulations.

On Monday, Wu Qianyu, a senior official with Shanghai’s health commission, said Covid-19 positive children – even if they are asymptomatic or have mild symptoms – must be isolated from anyone who tested negative.

Only Covid-positive parents were permitted to accompany their young children into the fangcang, Wu said.

Footage of children in state-run wards at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centre was widely shared online. Photo: Twitter
State news agency Xinhua reported on Tuesday that 1,000 beds at the expo centre facility had been set aside for children younger than seven, and 177 children had been admitted with their parents. It did not say how many of the parents had tested negative.

The two Shanghai sources said only a few Covid-negative parents had been granted exemptions to enter the fangcang with their children.
The review process was stringent and Covid-negative parents had to sign a letter agreeing to abide by the facility’s procedures, the executives said.

The plight of quarantined children was highlighted on the weekend when footage emerged online of babies isolated in state-run wards at the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centre in the southwestern district of Jinshan.

It is common for parents to stay with their sick children in hospital under normal circumstances.


Meng Tianying, a senior executive at Shanghai-based consultancy Domo Medical, said the easing was a positive step.
“Humanity should be given priority in treating Covid-19 patients, particularly those who have mild or even no symptoms,” Meng said.

“It is important for children to be with their parents when they fall sick.”

Shanghai has reserved more than 77,000 quarantine beds for Covid-19 patients at public hospitals and fangcang, a kind of makeshift hospital used in Wuhan two years ago.

The temporary hospitals are not only used for treating infected people, but as quarantine sites to stop the spread of the virus.

Gu Honghui, a deputy secretary general of the Shanghai government, said on Tuesday that everybody who tested positive must be transferred to a designated hospital or quarantine site.

Shanghai reported a record 13,354 new Covid-19 infections on Tuesday, with total cases topping 73,000 since the outbreak began on March 1.

The mainland’s most developed metropolis has been under a de facto citywide lockdown since Friday and there is no time frame for an end to the shutdown.