Notice on Strengthening Community Efforts on the Prevention and Control of the Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia Epidemic

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/fjBfo-6lx_HksDP8_4C8sQ

Issued by Pneumonia Mechanism [2020] No.5

To the joint prevention and control work mechanisms against novel coronavirus pneumonia of each province, autonomous region, directly-governed municipality, and of the Xinjiang production and construction corps.

In order to implement comprehensive prevention and control measures centred on community prevention and control, to guide communities to carry out prevention and control work against the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak in a scientific and orderly way, to promptly discover cases of the illness, and to effectively curb its diffusion and spread, we hereby notify you as follows on strengthening your community prevention and control work against the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak:

I. General Requirements

Fully make use of community mobilization capacity, implement grid management plus blanket management, masses-centred prevention and control, and stability-centred prevention and control, and effectively put into action comprehensive prevention and control measures, to the effect that you achieve early discovery, early reporting, early isolation, early diagnosis, and early treatment, and halt the virus from entering, spreading, and leaving areas, to control transmission.

II. Specific Tasks

(1) County (district) level health departments and medical hygiene establishments.

1. Health administration departments should organize within their jurisdictions for personnel from primary-level medical and health-care organizations to participate in training on discovery and reporting, epidemiological investigation, specimen collection, health care-associated infection, personal protection, etc., against novel coronavirus pneumonia, to build their capacity related to prevention and control and diagnosis and treatment. Send out public notices, to caution persons from Wuhan within your jurisdictions, and require that they go to community health centres to register and undergo at-home medical observation for a period of 14 days.

2. Medical establishments should strengthen work on pre-examination and triage, based on a patient’s symptoms and pathology and history, guide those with cases to be seen at specialist fever and respiratory clinics. Provide patients seeking medical attention with protective items such as single-use face masks to reduce the opportunities for transmission to occur in hospitals. Refer confirmed cases of novel coronavirus pneumonia to designated hospitals for further diagnosis and treatment; strengthen work on prevention and control against infection inside hospitals.

3. CDCs should strengthen epidemiological investigation and handling of individual cases and cluster cases, investigate in detail the source of infection of the cases, and determine the scope of spread, evaluate the impact and the possible ways it might develop, get a grasp of persons who have come into contact from the point of incidence to the point at which isolation took place, and determine who has come into close contact. Guide the implementation of hygiene measures for regular public arenas, transportation, and collective units, focusing mainly on keeping environments clean and opening windows for ventilation, and using an appropriate amount of disinfecting when necessary.

(2) Neighborhoods (townships) and communities (villages).

1. Carry out online, blanket management Communities shall establish organization systems for novel coronavirus pneumonia prevention and control work, set up work teams combining full-time and part-time people, and attach responsibilities to individuals and establish contact at the household level, to ensure that each element of prevention and control measures is fully implemented and no corner is left uncovered. Encourage the community's residents to participate in prevention and control activities.

2. Strengthen efforts to keep tabs on people. Treating communities as grids, strengthen health monitoring of the people within them, look into the situation regarding people who come and go, and adopt prevention and control measures in a targeted way. Prioritize keeping tabs on and urging persons who come from Wuhan municipality where the epidemic outbreak began to undergo at-home medical observation for a period of 14 days. Monitor their state of health, and on discovering any abnormalities promptly report and adopt the necessary prevention and control measures and halt the epidemic from coming in. Fully utilize methods using big data, carry out precision management vis-à-vis persons from Wuhan, ensure that efforts to keep tabs on them are done to full effect, implement medical observation, make use of the combined energies of sub-district (community) cadres, community health centre medical personnel and the ranks of family doctors, and raise the level of sensitivity and meticulousness of efforts to keep tabs (on people).

3．Do a good job of managing those with close contact. Mobilize community grid personnel, contracted family doctors, and prevention and control health-care doctors to carry out standardized management of the persons in close contact with confirmed cases and suspected cases, cooperate with CDCs to carry out standardized case epidemiological investigation and regulation through keeping tabs on those in close contact, put into action at-home medical observation for those in close contact, and promptly in accordance with procedure set in motion procedures to pinpoint the right people, diagnose, isolate and treat, etc..

4. Vigorously carry out a patriotic hygiene movement. Step up the intensity of specific measures to address environmental hygiene, strictly conduct cleaning, disinfection and ventilation of the community’s public spaces where groups of people gather, in particular strengthen steps to address environments in agricultural markets, ensure that measures to address the hygiene of environments are put into action in every community, unit, and household, to prevent transmission.

5. Strengthen publicity and education on health. Use multiple means, like the“A Letter For You”approach, to communicate in a targeted way knowledge about the prevention and control of infectious diseases such as the novel coronavirus, send out health notices and medical guides, to guide members of the public in a scientific way to correctly understand and prevent against the disease, and to encourage the public to engage in standardized behaviours toward prevention and control, to engage in effective personal protection, to do their best to reduce large-scale public gatherings and activities, and to promptly seek medical assistance should symptoms emerge.

III. Work Assurances

(1) County (district) Party committees and governments should strengthen the organization of and leadership over prevention and control work related to the novel coronavirus pneumonia within their jurisdictions, implement jurisdictional responsibility, establish joint prevention and control work mechanisms or prevention and control command centres, promptly adjust prevention and control strategies, provide earmarked funds and resource assurances, and supervise, direct and inspect the situation on the ground regarding implementation of each element of community prevention and control.

(2) Medical and health-care institutions at each level shall establish novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic prevention and control work mechanisms, strengthen cooperation with communities, guide communities to ensure discovery, prevention and control, and emergency handling of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic is all done to proper effect, and effectively implement regulatory measures such as those to pinpoint persons in close contact, to ensure seamless links across efforts.

(3) Sub-districts (townships) and communities (villages) shall attach great importance to novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic prevention and control work, strengthen awareness of responsibility and have the courage to shoulder tasks and take action, establish and perfect epidemic prevention and control work mechanisms and grid work systems, and proactively launch comprehensive prevention and control work such as monitoring and keeping tabs on cases, publicity efforts to educate and share the science, health notices, information reports, and patriotic health campaigns, so as to effectively control the spread and transmission of the epidemic.

Attachments: Community Work Plans for Prevention and Control of the Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia Epidemic (Provisional)

Joint Prevention and Control Work Mechanism for Responding to Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia Epidemic, 24 January 2020

(Information disclosure type: Proactive Disclosure)

Attachments:

Community Work Plans for Prevention and Control of the Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia Epidemic (Provisional)

This work plan was formulated on the basis of the Law of the PRC on the Prevention and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, the Law of the PRC on the Promotion of Basic Medical and Health Care, the Regulations on Reponses to Public Health Emergencies, the Plan for the Event of Public Health Emergencies, the Plan for the Monitoring of Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia Cases, and other relevant documents and regulations in order to implement comprehensive prevention and control measures centred on community prevention and control, to guide communities to carry out prevention and control work against the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic in a scientific and orderly way, to discover cases as early as possible, to effectively curb the diffusion and spread of the epidemic, and to reduce the harm to the public health caused by the novel coronavirus.

I. Work Requirements

(1) Party and government take the lead and communities mobilise to implement grid and blanket management, ensuring that all prevention and control measures are effectively put into effect.

(2) Put into effect the principle of early discovery, early reporting, early isolation, early diagnosis, and early treatment, to ensure that community work on novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic discovery, prevention and control, and emergency response and handling is carried out effectively.

II. Relevant Definitions

（1）Community. "Community" in this Plan refers to the urban or rural communities (including city districts and villages) in the jurisdiction of neighborhood offices or township people's governments

(2) Community epidemic divisions.

1. Communities with no discovered cases. Refers to having no confirmed cases of pneumonia from novel coronavirus infection found among the community residents.

2. Communities with cases or outbreaks of the epidemic.

Community emergence of cases. Refers to when, among the residents of a community, one confirmed case has emerged of the novel coronavirus pneumonia, but further cases have not yet emerged.

Outbreak of the epidemic. Refers to when, within a 14-day period, within a small scope (e.g. one houseful, one construction site, the same block in one building, etc.) two or more confirmed cases are discovered, case-to-case there may be some possibility of person-to-person transmission caused by close contact or infection due to common exposure.

3. Community transmission of the epidemic. Refers to when, among the residents of a community, within a 14-day period, two or more scattered cases emerge of which the source of infection is unclear, or outbreaks of the epidemic occur in relatively large numbers and on a relatively large scale, presenting a state of continued transmission.

(3) Differentiating between infected points and infected areas.

1. Infected point. If a community sees a case emerge or an outbreak of the epidemic, confirm the scope possibly contaminated by the case as an infected point. In principle, in the first three days a sick person became ill to the time of isolation and treatment, all places they went, places where the person stopped for a period of more than one hour, with relatively small spaces and poor ventilation, should be listed as infected points and managed as such. The unit of measure for an infected point will usually be one or a number of household(s), one or a number of office(s), the carriage of a train or automobile, the same flight, the same infected area, the same building, and so on.

2. Infected area. If community transmission of the epidemic occurs, based on the relevant stipulations in the Law of the PRC on the Prevention and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, it can be confirmed to be an infected area.

(4) Those in close contact.

Having any of the following contacts after the onset of a case, but not employing effective protections:

1. persons who live, study, or work together with the case or other persons in close contact, e.g. they work in close proximity or use the same classroom or live together in the same house;

2. Health professionals involved in diagnosis and treatment, nursing, or watching over the case, family members or other persons who have similar close contact with the case, e.g. those directly diagnosing, treating and nursing the case, those who visit or stay in the closed environment where the case is, and other patients and their accompanying and caregiving persons in the same ward;

3. Persons who rode on the same transportation as the case and came into close contact, including persons who took care of them on a form of transportation, those persons who travelled with the ill person (family members, colleagues, friends, etc.), other passengers or onboard service personnel who, after investigation and evaluation are discovered to have possibly come into close contact with them;

4. Those who, after on-site investigation personnel have investigated, through evaluation are believed to fit the profile of others who have come into contact with persons in close contact.

III. Community Prevention and Control Strategies and Measures

(1) Communities with no cases discovered.

Implement a “protect against the external coming in” strategy, with specific measures including organizing and mobilizing, health education, notification of information, management of persons returning from infected areas, environmental hygiene governance, resource preparation, etc.

1. Organizing and mobilizing: communities shall establish novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic prevention and control work organization systems, which will, for the main part, be made up of sub-district (township) and community (village) cadre, community health centres and family doctors; encourage residents and volunteers to participate, form work teams combining part-time and full-time personnel, implement grid and blanket management, see that responsibility is attached to specific people, carry out full coverage of communities (villages), buildings (natural villages), and households, to put into action prevention and control measures.

2. Health education: fully utilize multiple means, to put out targeted publicity on knowledge about the novel coronavirus pneumonia, actively advocate stressing hygiene and cutting out bad habits, abandon uncivilized behaviours like littering and spitting, and foster a positive atmosphere in which “every person is the number-one person responsible for their own health” and people get the idea that “I’m in charge of my own health.” See that the public fully understands knowledge on health, grasps the main points on protection, cultivates good habits including hand washing, frequently ventilating, and maintaining cleanliness, reduce their comings and goings, avoid taking part in gatherings and get-togethers, take proper protective measures when riding on public transport or going to crowded places, wear masks, avoid contact with animals (especially wild animals), birds and their excrement.

3. Notification of information: publish information for the public on medical consultation, those who present with respiratory symptoms but do not have a fever should go to community health protection centres (township health-care institutions) to seek medical advice, those who do have a fever should go to fever clinics, and those who have contracted the novel coronavirus should go to designated hospitals. Publish information on the epidemic in the community every day, and give reminders of the risks of going out and travel.

4. Management of persons returning from infected areas: communities shall issue public notices requiring that persons who are returning from infected areas immediately go to the village (Party) branch or community where they are to register, and go to the local health institution or village doctor or the community health centre to undergo health checks, have health checks twice daily, and meanwhile take it upon themselves to isolate themselves for 14 days. All persons who return from infected areas and present with fever and respiratory symptoms shall promptly seek medical attention nearby to be checked out, and according to requirements shall remain at home in isolation or go to a government-designated location or hospital to go into isolation; those in close contact with them should also immediately self-isolate at home or go to a local designated location for isolation. During the period of isolation please maintain contact with local medical personnel or CDC, in order to be kept tabs on and observed.

5. Environmental hygiene governance: communities shall undertake comprehensive prevention and control measures against vector organisms using mainly environmental corrective measures and supplementing this with chemical solutions to kill them off, carry out hygienic cleaning in priority sites such as residential estates, waste transfer stations, building sites, etc., handle waste contamination, eliminate the breeding environments of vector organisms such as rats, cockroaches, mosquitoes, and flies etc. Promptly organise and conduct vector organism prevention and control and eradication, to effectively reduce the density of vector organisms.

6. Resource preparation: communities and households should have ready the necessary prevention and control goods and resources, e.g. thermometers, masks, disinfectants etc.

(2) Communities with cases or outbreaks of the epidemic.

Adopt “internal prevention against spread, external prevention against exporting out” strategies, specifically including the above six measures, as well as managing those in close contact and strengthening disinfecting.

7.密切接触者管理：充分发挥社区预防保健医生、家庭签约医生、社区干部等网格管理员的作用，对新型冠状病毒感染的肺炎确诊病例的密切接触者开展排查并实施居家或集中医学观察，有条件的应明确集中观察场所。 每日随访密切接触者的健康状况，指导观察对象更加灵敏的监测自身情况的变化，并随时做好记录。 做好病人的隔离控制和转送定点医院等准备工作。

8. Disinfection: Communities should assist epidemic control in disinfecting infection sites such as households, buildings, offices, and meeting rooms with cases, as well as other public places.

(3) Community spread of the epidemic.

Employ the strategy of 'preventing spreading within, and preventing export outside', specifically including the 8 measures described above as well as the two measures of sealing quarantine areas and limiting congregations of people.

9. Sealing infected areas: When necessary, measures may be adopted to seal communities designated as infected areas, such as restricting people's entry and exit, or temporarily requisitioning housing, vehicles, and so forth.

10. Limit congregations of people: Within the community, limit or stop community gatherings, assemblies, and other activities that concentrate groups of people together; close the public baths, hot springs, movie theaters, Internet bars, KTV, shopping malls. and other such public places. When necessary, stop work, operations, or classes.