China reports no new local COVID-19 cases for first time since July

China's health authority reported on Monday that there were no new locally transmitted cases of COVID-19 for the first time since July, offering more signs that the current outbreak which began late last month may be tapering off soon.

The latest outbreak was driven mainly by infections first detected on July 20 among a few airport workers in the eastern city of Nanjing who had been contracted to the highly transmissible Delta variant, first identified in India.

Since then, more than 1,200 people in China have been confirmed to be infected, though not all of them were cases of the Delta variant.

The outbreak has spurred local authorities across the country to impose tough counter-epidemic measures including mass testing for millions of people to identify and isolate carriers, as well as treat the infected.

No one has died in the current outbreak, which has largely focused on the cities of Nanjing and Yangzhou in the province of Jiangsu, near the financial hub of Shanghai.

Across China, new local cases fell to the single-digits last week, after peaking in early August.

But over the weekend, Shanghai placed hundreds of people under quarantine after infections were found in cargo workers at one of its two airports, sparking concerns of a fresh outbreak in the city.

Shanghai has reported no new local infections since then.