SHIJIAZHUANG - Residents of Shijiazhuang, capital of north China's Hebei Province, are required to keep staying at home until Jan. 19 to prevent the spread of COVID-19, according to the city's epidemic prevention and control headquarters office.

Previously, all residents in Shijiazhuang and the neighboring Xingtai City were asked to stay at home for seven days after citywide nucleic acid testing was completed a week ago.

In Xingtai, residents except for those in Nangong are allowed to resume life and production order from Saturday, as all samples collected from two rounds of citywide nucleic acid testings were negative in Xingtai except in the county-level city of Nangong, according to the COVID-19 prevention and control office of Xingtai.

By the end of Thursday, there were 553 locally transmitted confirmed cases and two imported cases being treated in hospitals in Hebei, mostly in Shijiazhuang and Xingtai.