As of 24:00, February 21st, Guangdong had reported 6 new cases, pushing the total number of infected patients to 1339.

Guangzhou confirmed 4 new cases, while Shenzhen and Zhaoqing reported 2 new cases in total on February 21st.

The 28th press conference on Guangdong's fight against the coronavirus (COVID-19) was held in Guangzhou today.

Ji Leqin, counsel for the Health Commission of Guangdong Province explained that Guangdong will officially launch a ‘health code’ service, which will be used to solve the kind of difficulties encountered during epidemic control, such as repeated collection of health information and inconsistent recognition of isolation between regions.

Users should fill in their personal information and travel history on ‘Yuekang Ma’ (粤康码) on the mini program "Yueshengshi" (粤省事). After analysis and decision making based on big data, users would be given a red code or a green code, which respectively represent high risk (red) and low risk/good health (green).

"People do not need to have their temperature checked if they present the green code when entering communities or other public places," said Ji.

It has been two weeks since Guangdong fully resumed production on February 10th.

Yang Pengfei, deputy director-general of Guangdong Industry and Information Technology Department, reported that as of February 21st, nearly 42,000 large-scale industrial enterprises have resumed production, with the return to work rate in Guangdong rising to 82.2%. The rate for large-scale industrial enterprises are over 90% in Guangzhou and Yangjiang.

In addition, many of the well-known enterprises in Guangdong including Huawei, Midea and Gree have resumed production.

Yang also stressed that Guangdong is actively dealing with problems including the shortage of masks and other epidemic prevention supplies.

"We estimate that the current shortage of epidemic prevention supplies will be greatly reduced at the end of February", said Yang.

According to Lao Chaohui, director of the Guangdong Transportation Services Center, Guangzhou, Zhuhai, Foshan, Shanwei and Zhongshan have incrementally removed temperature-check points at the toll gates of highways, while the 256 joint quarantine stations at the province borders, which were approved by the provincial government, have been maintained. There is still temperature screening at coach stations, railway stations, airports and port terminals, however.

Authors: Steven & Zoey (intern)

Editors: Olivia & Simon