GUANGZHOU, April 23 (Xinhua) -- Guangzhou, capital of southern China's Guangdong Province, has started novel coronavirus tests on 208,000 teachers, staff, and students in their final year of junior and senior high schools, local authorities said.

As of Thursday noon, the city has completed nucleic acid tests on 193,000 teachers and students in graduating classes in high schools, according to a press briefing by the Guangzhou municipal government Thursday.

Among the total, about 38,000 have received the results, which all were negative.

In Guangzhou, grade three students will return to school on April 27 and nucleic acid tests on them started on April 21.