Shanghai tightens lockdown despite falling COVID cases

BEIJING (AP) — Authorities in Shanghai have again tightened anti-virus restrictions, just as the city was emerging from a month of strict lockdown due to a COVID-19 outbreak. Notices issued in several districts said residents were ordered to stay home and nonessential deliveries suspended as part of a “quiet period” lasting at least until Wednesday. It wasn’t clear what prompted the renewed tightening, with numbers of new cases in the city continuing to fall. Shanghai on Monday reported less than 4,000 cases over the previous 24 hours, almost all of them without symptoms, along with 11 deaths. Authorities have been gradually lifting isolation rules on the city’s 25 million residents, but the new orders appear to be returning conditions to those at the early stage of the outbreak.