As winter approaches, Beijing is comprehensively improving its monitoring and early warning capabilities for COVID-19 prevention and control, the city's COVID-19 epidemic prevention and control authorities said on Wednesday.

According to Gao Xiaojun, spokesperson for the Beijing Municipal Health Commission, the city's daily nucleic acid testing capacity will exceed 600,000 copies by the end of November.

At present, the infectious disease reporting and management system covers the city's 686 infectious disease diagnosis and treatment institutions. The city's 8,941 primary medical institutions have also established monitoring and reporting systems for eight symptoms, including fever, and a total of 1,014 pharmacies have been designated as sentinel surveillance posts for early disease prevention. 

As of October 10, 116 community-level fever screening "sentries" have been set up, and an early warning mechanism has been established to monitor and analyze cold chain food production, business operation environments, and personnel.

The city has also made preparations for potential epidemiological investigations. Gao said that staff have been drawn from the city-level and district-level disease control centers to form a team of 3,600 people. In addition, the city's emergency management mechanism has been improved.

So too has Beijing's nucleic acid testing capabilities. At present, there are 229 nucleic acid testing laboratories in the capital, with a daily testing capacity of 520,000 tests. By the end of November, the city's daily testing capacity will increase to more than 600,000.

A total of 17 fever clinics in 14 municipal hospitals will be upgraded. The number of fever clinics will also be increased from 40 to 97.

Following the requirements of the "city-district-institution" three-level equipment reserve system, the city will conduct dynamic reserve monitoring on 11 types of protective materials and a variety of disinfection products.

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