A Covid-hit Chinese city is offering thousands of dollars for anyone giving clues in tracing the source of its latest outbreak, as part of a “people's war” to stamp out one of the country's largest resurgences in months, AFP reports.

The current outbreak has hit more than 40 cities, and officials in Heihe — a northern city on the border with Russia — said they would offer 100,000 yuan ($15,500) as a reward for information.

“In order to uncover the source of this virus outbreak as soon as possible and find out the chain of transmission, it is necessary to wage a people's war of epidemic prevention and control,” the city government said in a notice.