Xi Jinping and the status of the pandemic-era crisis: a tweet from a female sexrapelling activist in China

Her video of her shouting abuse at the hazmat-suited workers below went viral on social media where it appears to show the growing frustration of the Chinese public with their government.

The woman has been under some form of escort for over a year after returning from university. They stare back, seemingly unmoved.

While most Asian economies – even those with previously hardline zero-Covid stances – are abandoning pandemic-era restrictions, authorities in China remain zealous in theirs, repeatedly insisting this week in state-run media articles that the battle against the virus remains “winnable.”

That claim comes even as infections flare and a new strain circulates just days before the country’s most important political event, the Communist Party Congress beginning in Beijing on Sunday at which Xi Jinping is expected to cement his place as the country’s most powerful leader in decades.

Observers across the world will be keeping an eye on the twice-a-decade meeting for signs that the party is more interested in the economy than it is in social issues.

The Weibo Day of Covid-19: When China re-joins Twitter to protest against Xi, the hero, and the leader

Nerves are high in China’s capital, where online photos posted Thursday appeared to show an exceptionally rare public protest against Xi. Do not take the Covid test if you want to enjoy food. No to lockdown, yes to freedom. It’s not okay to lie, but it’s okay to be dignified. No to cultural revolution, yes to reform. No to great leader, yes to vote. There is heightened security surrounding the congress but banners are hung over the overpass to say Don’t be a slave, be a citizen.

Weibo, a Twitter-like platform, immediately censored search results for “Sitong Bridge,” the site of the protest. Key words such as Beijing,Haidian, warrior,brave man, and even “courage” were restricted before long.

Numerous accounts on Weibo and WeChat, the super-app essential for daily life in China, have been banned after commenting on – or alluding to – the protest.

Still, many spoke out to express their support and awe. Some shared the Chinese pop hit “Lonely Warrior” in a veiled reference to the protester, who some called a “hero,” while others swore never to forget, posting under the hashtag: “I saw it.”

With the state media articles this week serving to damp speculation that the country might change tack after Congress, there is a sense that the party will stick with the zero- Covid approach.

According to CNN calculations, more than 300 million people in China were affected by some kind of lockdown at one point last month.

Widespread protests against China’s zero-COVID policies erupted across the country in November, prompting China to roll back a series of measures, including mass testing. Chinese public health officials say a surge of Covid outbreak could affect 800 million people over the next few months.

The reports show that on Tuesday alone, 37 million people were new to Covid-19 in China. That stood in dramatic contrast to the official number of 3,049 new infections reported that day.

The outbreak of the BF.7 Coronavirus outbreak in Inner Mongolia: the push for a better public health regime in the 21st century

Spooked by the possibility of unpredictable and unannounced snap lockdowns – and mindful that authorities have previously backtracked after suggesting that no such measures were coming – some people in the city have reportedly been hoarding drinking water.

The announcement of the water quality action taken by the municipal water authorities has made that panic buying worse.

Exactly what is driving the increase in infections is not clear, though authorities are scrambling to contain the spread of the BF.7 coronavirus strain after it was first detected in China in late September in Hohhot, the capital city of Inner Mongolia.

Despite of its strict curbs, the country has also seen an increase in cases in domestic tourist destinations, despite people being discouraged from spending money over China’s Golden Week holiday.

More than 240,000 university students in Inner Mongolia have been locked down on campuses due to the latest outbreak, according to Zhang Xiaoying, a deputy director of the regional Department of Education. The university Communist Party boss had to be fired after 39 students from his institution tested positive in the campus outbreak.

In the far western part of the country there are 22 million people who are banned from leaving and required to stay. Xinjiang recorded 403 new cases on Thursday, according to an official tally.

Yet amid it all, Beijing appears unwilling to move from its hardline stance. For three days this week, the state-run Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily published commentaries reiterating that China would not let its guard down.

The battle against Covid was winnable, it insisted. Other countries that had reopened and eased restrictions had done so because they had no choice, it said, as they had failed to “effectively control the epidemic in a timely manner.”

Health experts and economists expected the ruling Communist Party to keep restrictions on travel into China until at least mid-2023 while it carries out a campaign to vaccinate millions of elderly people. Experts say that is necessary to prevent a public health crisis.

The new measures were announced Friday following a meeting by the ruling Communist Party’s top decision-making body, during which leaders vowed to maintain Covid protocols while stressing the need to minimize economic and social disruptions.

China’s new zero-COVID policy revisited after the onset of the first SARS-Covid-19 epidemic in September

The heavy economic and social costs of the zero- tolerance approach have caused mounting public backlash.

The easing of the measures will see authorities scrap the so-called “circuit breaker” mechanism, under which China-bound flights were suspended if an airline was found to carry a certain number of passengers who tested positive for Covid upon landing.

All passengers over the age of 2 will be able to carry a vaccine in the new year, according to the CDC. Passengers on direct flights or indirect flights must have a negative test no more than two days before departure.

Markets responded positively to the changes as Covid-19 restrictions have kept international investors jittery. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index shot up 7% just after the noon break local time, while mainland China’s benchmark Shanghai Composite Index rose 2.5%.

The new guidelines mean that people who are identified as close contacts of Covid-19 cases will have a shorter time at government-operated facilities, from seven days to five days.

The Chinese government issued new guidelines easing some of its strict zero-COVID policies on Wednesday. Testing requirements and travel restrictions have been relaxed, and people infected with SARS-CoV-2 who have mild or no symptoms are for the first time allowed to isolate at home instead of in centrally managed facilities. researchers worry that changes will lead to more infections in hospitals.

The number of new domestically transmitted cases was reported by the government on Thursday, the highest in months, and the authorities expected the situation to get worse.

The National Health Commission warned that the epidemic “is likely to further expand in scope and scale” due to mutations and weather factors in the winter and spring.

On Wednesday, China’s health authorities overhauled the zero- Covid policy with a 10-point national plan that kept some restrictions, but largely scrapped health code tracking for most public places, rolled back mass testing, allowed many positive cases to stymy in their homes, and imposed limits

“Everything changed overnight, and everything changed overnight,” said a freelancer in Shanghai after the first lockdown and a friend’s disbelief

There was a sense of uncertainty about what the future holds after the changes were implemented, many of which were greeted with relief, but also with a sense of worry.

“The world changed overnight, and that’s really great,” said a manager at a tech company. We are getting back to regular life now for me. This is important to me because if I don’t get back to a normal life, I might lose my mind.”

“How can it change so fast?” Ding asked. It makes me feel like we’re fools, that’s for sure. It is up to them. They said it’s good, so then it’s good … that’s what I feel right now. It is so unreal, but I have no choice. All I can do is follow the arrangement.

David Wang, 33, a freelancer in Shanghai, said although the changes were welcome, they had also sparked a feeling of disbelief in the city, which underwent a chaotic, more than two-month-long, citywide lockdown earlier this year.

“Of course I was very happy about these new changes – (but) most of my friends are showing typical signs of PTSD, they just can’t believe it’s happening,” he said.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/08/china/china-zero-covid-relaxation-reaction-intl-hnk/index.html

What Do Beijing and other Chinese Health Officials Tell Us About Covid-19? The Case of Bob Li, a University Student in Beijing, who Tested the Viral Virus

The health officials in Beijing said that the new rules were based on evidence, for example the vaccine rate and China’s experience in fighting the disease.

The health code tracking rules that were used to control the spread of disease were rolled back by the top health officials. Some aspects of those measures, such as health code use in designated places and central quarantine of severe cases, as well as home isolation of cases, remain.

The government and state media had long emphasized the dangers of the virus and its potential long-term effects – and used this to justify the maintenance of restrictive policies.

There is a feeling of whiplash caused by a flood of articles that describe the more mild nature of Omicron, and make no mention of its real risks, which is not the kind of public messaging that other countries did before their own policies changed.

Meanwhile, experts have warned a lack of experience with the virus – and years of state media coverage focusing on its dangers and impact overseas, before a recent shift in tone – could push those who are not in critical need to seek medical care, further overwhelming systems.

On China’s heavily moderated social media platform Weibo, topics and hashtags related to what to do if infected by Omicron trended high on Thursday morning, while there were numerous reports of panic buying of fever medications.

The government needs to provide clearer guidance on how to handle a surge in infections, says Adam Chen. The resilience of the Chinese health system will be tested.

Bob Li, a graduate student in Beijing, who tested positive for the virus on Friday said he wasn’t afraid of the virus, but his mother, who lives in the countryside, stayed up all night worrying about him. Li said that she found the virus very scary.

“I think most people in rural China may have some misunderstandings about the virus, which may come from the overhyping of this virus by the state in the past two years. This is one of the reasons why people are so afraid,” he said, adding that he still supports the government’s careful treatment of Covid-19 during the pandemic.

Meanwhile, his mother was now buying high-grade N95 masks and preparing for a “nuclear winter” until a potential initial wave of cases passed, Wang said.

The implementation of the zero-COVID 19-test in Beijing is going to be messy and hasty: How much do local governments want?

Many are watching to see how the guidelines are implemented in their cities after some confusion about how they were implemented.

Beijing authorities said a negative Covid 19-test would still need to be present in order to eat at restaurants or enter some entertainment venues, contrary to the national guidelines.

When her health code turned yellow, it meant that she would not be allowed into most public places, until she had a second test that showed a negative result. Now, with the new rules she knew she could largely go out freely, but instead she stayed at home to “wait and see.”

The announcement last week that it was ending a number of the most serious measures was followed by the move. Three years of lockdowns, restrictions on travel, mandated testing, and requirements that a clean bill of health be shown to public areas followed.

The changes move China “in the right direction”, says Adam Chen, a public-health researcher at the University of Georgia in Athens. They try to balance the need to protect vulnerable people from getting infections with the need to reduce economic harms of lock downs.

But the government hasn’t stated the goal of its new policy, which could create confusion, says Huang. It is likely that the steps will lead to a messy and hasty transition, where local governments ditch all zero-COVID measures without investing serious in preparing for the transition, says Huang, who would have liked to see the reopening happen in phases.

Some aspects of the new rules, like when and where to test people during an outbreak, make it open to interpretation by local governments.

Many people in China live in densely populated high-rise buildings, where it will be difficult to limit transmission. Allowing people to quarantine at home will contribute to viral spread, says George Liu, a public-health researcher at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia. This could cause a lot of problems for hospitals.

The timing of the reopening isn’t ideal. Hospitals will be seeing a rise in patients during winter because of the Influenza peak season. And many people will also be travelling across the country for next month’s Lunar New Year and spring festival, further increasing viral spread, says Xi Chen, an economist at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, who studies China’s public-health system.

China doesn’t have a strong system for primary medical care system, such as a network of general practitioners, so people go to hospital for mild conditions, says Xi Chen, who hopes more details on how the government plans to triage care will emerge in the coming days.

Without additional support, the eased restrictions might not help businesses to recover from protracted lockdowns or remove the social stigma attached to COVID-19, says Joy Zhang, a sociologist at the University of Kent in Canterbury, UK. I fear that the health risk will be passed on to individuals.

Cowling says that there needs to be urgent guidance on how to curb transmission during a surge. And given the reduction in testing, it is not clear how officials will track whether cities are approaching, or have passed, the peak of an infection wave, he says.

Researchers are concerned that hasty changes will not leave enough time to ramp up vaccination among older people. More than half of people between the ages of 60 and 80 have received a third dose of the vaccine.

The guidelines propose setting up mobile clinics, and training medical staff to address people’s safety concerns to boost vaccination. They don’t issue vaccine mandates or bring in strong incentives for local governments to increase their vaccination rates. Whether the inevitable rise in infections will lead to a spike in deaths remains to be seen. “The full impact remains to be unfolded,” he says.

The impact of China’s zero-covid policy on a human rights activist: Tan Hua Xiuzhen’s dog bites a man

“I have an advantage in that I don’t go to an office to work. She doesn’t have a job at a company or a government agency and doesn’t really get to know a lot of people. I think I protect myself well.

Since they blamed the vaccine, Hua has been working on a crusade for justice. She avoids all vaccines that China has approval for, including COVID-19.

The estimates follow China’s decision at the start of December to abruptly dismantle its strict zero-Covid policy which had been in place for almost three years.

For many, it has its roots in product quality issues that have for years plagued manufacturing in China — including its production of pharmaceuticals. Cases like Tan Hua’s resonate.

A dog bit a man in his thirties. She saw a doctor and was given a shot of what her mother, Hua Xiuzhen, says they were told was the best rabies vaccine on the market. But it didn’t go well.

Vaccination skews and product quality scandals in China: an example of a real estate executive with COVID-19 in a city like Shanghai

“That very night she got a headache and dizziness. Her memory waned very quickly. She had convulsions. She couldn’t see; everything was dark for her. She couldn’t walk straight,” Hua told NPR by phone.

China can force the population to bevaccinated. After all, it has put entire cities with tens of millions of people into strict lockdowns.

But lax oversight and corruption during recent decades of breakneck economic growth has led to a string of product quality scandals in China — from baby formula cut with industrial chemicals to contaminated blood thinner and tainted vaccines.​

Yanzhong Huang, a China health care expert at Seton Hall University, says the government has done a bad job of messaging around the virus and debunking myths — despite near total control of the media environment in the country.​

“Many of those, the vaccine skeptics, are liberal-minded people. They just don’t trust the Chinese vaccines and the government narrative on the effectiveness of the Chinese vaccines,” he says.

Jerry, a real estate executive in Shanghai, is 33 years old — and a good example of that. He did not want his full name used because of the sensitivity of the topic.

Jerry reckons COVID-19 is “kind of a flu thing” these days; nothing too serious. He hasn’t gotten the vaccine, and despite the fact that he isn’t a doctor, he doesn’t think there is any point.

The virus is changing so quickly that I think. So not a single vaccine can help,” he says, focusing on vaccines’ ability to prevent transmission rather than stave off serious illness and death.

Jerry estimates that the vaccination rate among his friends — educated, 30-somethings in China’s most cosmopolitan city — may be as low as 60%. He says people are afraid of the possible side effects of having a baby.

An omicron-driven outbreak struck Shanghai earlier this year. Multiple people told the AP then that their elderly family members who tested positive for COVID-19 and died were not counted in the city’s official death toll. The deaths of patients with underlying diseases were attributed to those diseases.

Vaccines, vaccines and the Rise of the World: The Beijing Crisis in Light of the Loss of the Zero-Covid App

The government could be better off increasing the incentives for people to get the vaccine and offering assurance of support in the event of something going wrong, says Huang.

Editor’s Note: A version of this story appeared in CNN’s Meanwhile in China newsletter, a three-times-a-week update exploring what you need to know about the country’s rise and how it impacts the world. You should sign up here.

Changes continued Monday as authorities announced a deactivation of the “mobile itinerary card” health tracking function planned for the following day.

At midnight on Monday, the smart phone app will cease to function, meaning residents’ travels will not be traced and recorded, potentially reducing the likelihood they will be forced into quarantine for visiting pandemic hot spots. China’s ruling Communist Party allows no independent parties to conduct verification and such apps have been used in past to suppress travel and free speech. It’s part of a package of apps, and the health code hasn’t been disabled.

But as the scrapping of parts of the zero-Covid infrastructure come apace, there are questions about how the country’s health system will handle a mass outbreak.

Beijing’s downtown streets were eerily quiet on Tuesday because there were so many people staying home. Small lines formed outside fever clinics — the number of which has been recently increased from 94 to 303 — and at pharmacies, where cold and flu medications have become harder to find.

Media outlet China Youth Daily documented hours-long lines at a clinic in central Beijing on Friday, and cited unnamed experts calling for residents not to visit hospitals unless necessary.

A hospital official on Saturday appealed to people with mild or no symptoms of Covid-positive diseases to not dial the city’s emergency line because of a surge in emergency calls.

The daily volume of emergency calls had surged from its usual 5,000 to more than 30,000 in recent days, Chen Zhi, chief physician of the Beijing Emergency Center said, according to official media.

The spread of Covid-19 in China: a social media interview with a Chinese doctor on Weibo over the weekend, and how to stay at home

In an interview published on state media Saturday, a Covid-19 expert said that the disease was spreading rapidly in China.

“No matter how strong the prevention and control is, it will be difficult to completely cut off the transmission chain,” Zhong, who has been a key public voice since the earliest days of the pandemic in 2020, was quoted saying by Xinhua.

The rapid rollback of testing nationwide and the shift by many people to use antigen tests at home has also made it difficult to gauge the extent of the spread, with official data now appearing meaningless.

Outside experts have warned that China may be underprepared to handle the expected surge of cases, after the surprise move to lift its measures in the wake of nationwide protests against the policy, growing case numbers and rising economic costs.

A boost shot for the elderly and other at risk is the government’s top priority now, especially with China’s lunar New Year coming up next month and a peak travel time when urban residents visit elderly relatives.

Increasing intensive care unit wards and beds, enhancing medical staff for intensive care, and setting up more clinics for diseases are measures that will be taken in China.

China’s market watchdog said on Friday that there was a “temporary shortage” of some “hot-selling” drugs and vowed to crackdown on price gouging, while major online retailer JD.com last week said it was taking steps to ensure stable supplies after sales for certain medications surged 18 times that week over the same period in October.

A hashtag trending on China’s heavily moderated social media platform Weibo over the weekend featured a state media interview with a Beijing doctor saying people who tested positive for Covid-19 but had no or mild symptoms did not need to take medication to recover.

People with no symptoms should not need medication. It’s possible to rest at home and keep a good mood. A doctor at Beijing You An Hospital said in an interview that he had seen more than 355 million views of a #trending on social media.

Social distancing in China: the number of COVID infections and deaths in intensive care units is increasing sharply from last month’s protests

China will no longer require a travel tracing requirement as part of its exit from a strict policy that has elicited a lot of discontent.

Last month in Beijing and several other cities, protests over the restrictions grew into calls for Xi and the Communist Party to step down — a level of public dissent not seen in decades. An unknown number of people were arrested after the party responded with a large show of force.

The relaxation has caused a new wave of infections and led to some concern about the size of the health care resources in some areas.

Those with mild symptoms are able to recuperate at home rather than be sent to field hospitals that have become notorious for overcrowding and poor hygiene.

Reports on the Chinese internet, which is tightly controlled by the government, sought to reassure a nervous public, stating that restrictions would continue to be dropped and travel, indoor dining and other economic activity would soon be returning to pre-pandemic conditions.

The World Health Organization warned last week that China may be behind the curve when it comes to reporting data. According to Michael Ryan of WHO Health Emergency Program, anecdotally the number of cases in the intensive care units in China are filling up. “Airfinity, a British health data firm, estimated last week that China’s true COVID figures were a million infections and 5,000 deaths a day. An official from the health department of the city of Qingdao in eastern China said on Friday that 500,000 new carbon dioxide cases a day were being seen. The report was shared by news outlets, but then seemed to have been edited later to remove the figures. There has been a surge in crematoriums need. China had earlier this month scrapped many of its very restrictive COVID measures following protests around the country that were critical of leadership. At least 10 people died in a fire in an apartment block in the city of Urumqi, which triggered the demonstrations. The deaths could have been prevented if the restrictions were loosened. In a recent briefing, the University of Washington’s Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation forecast up to 1 million deaths in 2023 if China does not maintain social distancing policies. Many are concerned that celebrations during next month’s Lunar New Year in China could become superspreader events.

Xi’s government promised to reduce the cost and disruption after the economy shrank by 2.6% from the previous quarter in the three months ending in June. The economists think the economy is probably not growing in the current quarter. Imports tumbled 10.9% from a year ago in November in a sign of weak demand.

There’s still a chance the ruling party will back off and impose restrictions if there’s a large-scale outbreak.

Last week’s announcement allowed considerable room for local governments to assign their own regulations. The rules are more strict for government offices in Beijing than for restaurants, and most require a negative test result over the previous 48 hours.

The Covid-19 crisis in Beijing: the State Department of China announces its ban on COVID-19 testing booths and the shutdown of consular offices

BEIJING — Some Chinese universities say they will allow students to finish the semester from home in hopes of reducing the potential of a bigger COVID-19 outbreak during the January Lunar New Year travel rush.

A decision could mean more Chinese visitors to Asia and Europe for the month of January, when the lunar new year is celebrated. They might spread it as infections surge in China.

Universities have been the scene of frequent lockdowns over the past three years, occasionally leading to clashes between the authorities and students confined to campus or even their dorm rooms.

The scrapping of the quark requirement is a big step towards reopening travel with the rest of the world, which was shut down after the outbreak because of fear of the disease.

Travelers arriving from abroad will no longer be required to submit to sputum tests on Jan. 8, according to the government. Foreign companies are pleased with the change as it helps revive business activity.

Despite the surge in cases, China has suspended most public testing booths, meaning there is no accurate public measure of the scale of infections across the country.

The Chinese government is under fire for downplaying the Covid deaths and it revealed that it had updated its count of dead caused by the virus.

The U.S. consulates in the northeastern Chinese city of Shenyang and the central city of Wuhan will offer only emergency services from Tuesday “in response to increased number of COVID-19 cases,” the State Department said.

“Mission China makes every effort to ensure full consular services are available to U.S. citizens living in the PRC, but further disruptions are possible,” an e-mailed message said, using the initials for China’s official name, the People’s Republic of China.

China has stopped publishing daily COVID-19 data, adding to concerns that the country’s leadership may be concealing negative information about the pandemic following the easing of restrictions.

The commission has stopped publishing daily figures on new infections where no symptoms are detected since it is impossible to accurately gauge how many people are affected, according to the website notice. The only numbers they’re reporting are confirmed cases detected in public testing facilities.

Beijing’s streets have grown eerily quiet, with lines forming outside fever clinics — the number of which has been increased from 94 to 303 — and at pharmacies, where cold and flu medications are harder to find.

A group of people waited for test results at a clinic in Beijing. Nurses in full body white protective gear are looking at patients.

A few kilometers (miles) south, at Chaoyang Hospital, about a dozen people waited in a line of blue tents, deflecting winds amid subzero temperatures. A person in the queue sprayed a bottle of Disinfectant around her as she waited.

A group of people waited in line for cough medication and Chinese herbal remedies on the other side of the street. The front of the store displayed a sign that stated “avoid panic and sloth, we are doing all we can to fulfill your needs.” A man came out and bought two packages of a Chinese herbal remedy, telling his customers he wouldn’t let them buy any more than that.

Hospitals have also reportedly been struggling to remain staffed, while packages were piling up at distribution points because of a shortage of China’s ubiquitous motorized tricycle delivery drivers.

How COVID-19 deaths have been measured in China and South Africa and Russia after the pandemic, according to an Associated Press investigation

The latest guidelines from the NHC states that the only deaths that can be classified are those caused by respiratory failure and pneumonia after contracting the virus.

The way the COVID-19 statistics are calculated and the way they are used have been found to be clouded by an AP investigation.

An Associated Press reporter saw multiple people being wheeled out of funeral homes in Beijing last week, and two relatives told the AP their loved ones had died after testing positive for COVID-19. Last week, however, the country did not report any deaths due to COVID-19.

Experts advise authorities to be cautious when counting deaths. Problems with death counts were raised in South Africa and Russia.

The World Health Organization estimated in May that nearly 15 million people died from COVID-19 or due to overwhelmed health systems in the first two years of the pandemic. That is more than the official death toll of over 6 million for that period.

The numbers look plausible but I don’t have any other data to compare them with. Ben Cowling, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Hong Kong told CNN in an email, “If the estimates are accurate, then the nationwide peak will occur within the next week.”

The NHC didn’t respond to a request for comment and the document that was circulating on Chinese social media had not been verified by the NHC.

According to two people who are familiar with the situation, Sun Yang, a deputy director of the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, gave the figures to the officials during a closed-door meeting.

The first twenty days of the Closed-door Covid outbreak in China: A bittersweet victory for foreign nationals in an increasingly isolated country

The figures are in stark contrast to the public data of the NHC, which reported just 62,592 symptomatic Covid cases in the first twenty days of December.

The minutes of the Wednesday closed-door NHC meeting made no reference to discussions concerning how many people may have died in China, according to both reports and the document CNN viewed.

The restrictions have prevented most Chinese from traveling abroad, limited face-to-face diplomatic exchanges and sharply reduced the number of foreigners in China for work and study.

China’s health commission said that steps would be taken to make it easier for some foreigners to enter the country, though it didn’t include tourists. It did indicate that Chinese would be gradually allowed to travel abroad for tourism again, an important source of revenue for hotels and related businesses in many countries.

The move followed rare public protests against the restrictions, which have slowed the economy, putting people out of work and driving restaurants and shops out of business.

The strategy became unsustainable when the fast spreading omicron variant arrived in late 2021, requiring ever widerlockups that stymied growth and disrupted lives.

For many Chinese nationals abroad, who have been unable to return or unwilling to endure the lengthy quarantine, the news meant they could finally go home — a bittersweet victory after much sacrifice.

The border is mostly closed to foreigners except for a limited number of business or family visits, and the government indicated Monday this could change.

A New Yorker with Border Quarantine Travel Reasoning in the Intl-Hnk (Brazil) During the Pandemic

“Finally, everybody can (live) their normal life,” said one Chinese national living in New York, who hasn’t been home for four years. She said the separation was very painful and that she had lost several family members and her beloved pet dog.

Her family did not attend my graduation. She said that they missed a lot of things. “And I also missed so many things for my family. During the Pandemic, all of my friends got married. Even some of them had babies. I feel like I missed everything, I missed the most important points in their lives.”

For the past three years, May Ma has been unable to go back to her hometown. The worst thing about the quarantine requirements had been worrying about her grandparents’ health, and not knowing if she’d be able to return in time to say goodbye if anything were to happen, she said.

Throughout the pandemic, “the scariest thing was … not knowing where the end is, not knowing when I can go back,” she said. “I can finally see the end, I feel very happy.”

Source: https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/china-border-quarantine-travel-reax-intl-hnk/index.html

China’s Border Quarantine Travel Rate Increased During the Lunar New Year Holiday Season Through the January 1st PCR Test

Those within China are also celebrating and anticipating outbound travel. Most have not left the country for several years and are now flooding booking sites to plan long-awaited vacations.

Trips.com reported that online searches for outbound flights and overseas hotels jumped to three-year peaks in the last year. Searches for popular destinations increased tenfold within half an hour of the announcement, with many people searching for outbound group tours during the Lunar New Year holiday season in late January, data shows.

Macao, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand, South Korea, the United States and the United Kingdom were among the website’s top 10 destinations with the fastest growth in search volume since the announcement.

“I feel like right now, it’s totally a mess,” said the Chinese national in New York. Everybody’s sick. It’s not a good time to be in my family’s house. Maybe two or three months later.

Some overseas destinations are on high alert. Officials in Italy’s northern Lombardy region have asked Milan’s Malpensa airport — one of the country’s largest international airports — to conduct PCR tests for all arrivals from China from now until the end of January.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/china-border-quarantine-travel-reax-intl-hnk/index.html

The South Korean PM’s Decree to Lunar New Year and the Implications for the State of the Economic Uncertainty

“It doesn’t matter if I can get back in time for Spring Festival,” said Ma in South Korea, referring to Lunar New Year. I can bear waiting a little while longer, as there is hope after all.

Visitors who test positive will be quarantined for one week, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced. He said that Japan would reduce the number of flights to and from China “just to be safe.”

The ruling Communist Party’s abrupt decision to lift some of the world’s strictest anti-virus controls comes as it tries reverse an economic downturn. It has ended curbs that confined millions of people to their homes and sparked protests, but hospitals have been flooded with feverish, wheezing patients as the virus spreads.

The British Chamber of Commerce hopes that China will restart normal business visa processing to allow more people to go to the country. It said that will “contribute to restoring optimism and reinstating China as a priority investment destination.”

Meanwhile, Japan said all visitors from China will undergo virus tests starting Friday as a “temporary emergency measure” in response to the country’s flood of infections.

Starting last month, however, the ruling party has gradually joined the United States and other governments that are trying to live with the virus by treating infections instead of imposing blanket quarantines on cities or neighborhoods.

After economic activity fell, the ruling party decided to make changes. More changes were made due to the protests in November.

Lu Haoming said that the government should have done it in a more methodical way. The death rate of this disease is not as bad as it was at the beginning, but the first shock has still been quite severe.

Also Monday, the government downgraded COVID-19 from a Class A infectious disease to a Class B disease and removed it from the list of illnesses that require quarantine. It said authorities will no longer be tracking down close contacts and will only look for areas that are at high or low risk of infections.

The BEIJING pandemic ends next month, and in 2020, China will resume issuing passports for Chinese tourists and business travelers

The foreign ministry of China urged parties to make sure the safe movement of people in and out of different countries is a priority.

“The US is following the science and advice of public health experts, consulting with partners, and considering taking similar steps we can take to protect the American people,” the officials said.

“We need all parties to work together scientifically against the epidemic to ensure the safe movement of people between countries, maintain the stability of the global industrial chain supply chain and promote the resumption of healthy growth in the world economy,” China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Wang Wenbin said in a briefing.

BEIJING — China says it will resume issuing ordinary visas and passports in another big step away from anti-virus controls that isolated the country for almost three years, setting up a potential flood of millions of Chinese going abroad for next month’s Lunar New Year holiday.

The National Immigration Administration of China will begin accepting applications for tourist’s passports on January 8. Hong Kong has a Chinese territory with its own border controls and it will resume issuing approval for tourists and business people to visit.

The agency will take applications for ordinary visas. It said the government will gradually resume allowing foreign visitors, but did not give any indication when full-scale tourist travel from abroad might be allowed.

Before the pandemic, China was the biggest source of foreign tourists for most of its Asian neighbors and an important market for Europe and the United States.

The American Chamber of Commerce in China says more than 70% of companies that responded to a poll this month expect the impact of the latest wave of outbreaks to last no more than three months, ending in early 2023.

“Reduced testing and case reporting in (China) and minimal sharing of viral genomic sequence data could delay the identification of new variants of concern if they arise,” the CDC said in a news release.

If you have been in China in the last 10 days, you’ll have to provide a negative test if you are flying through the other airports.

“These three transit hubs cover the overwhelming majority of passengers with travel originating in the PRC and the Special Administrative Regions,” the CDC said.

CDC is expanding the genetics testing program in the U.S. After the Omicron pandemic, New Year’s celebrations in Beijing

Passengers who tested positive more than 10 days before the flight can provide documentation of recovery from the virus in place of a negative test result.

The U.S. is expanding the voluntary genetics testing program, which involves collection of anonymous nasal tissue samples from travelers who arrive in the U.S. The CDC is adding two more airports to their program, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and Los Angeles International.

The CDC said that during the initial weeks of the Omicron surge, TGS detected two Omicron sub-variants and reported them to the global database weeks before they were reported elsewhere.

Hong Kong is also preparing for quarantine-free travel to China, with plans to resume operations of more border checkpoints as early as Jan. 8, according to a Facebook post by Hong Kong Chief Secretary Eric Chan.

Even though China is in the midst of a major outbreak of cases, residents were able to celebrate New Year’s in large-scale gatherings that were forbidden because of the Pandemic.

“There are still some worries, more or less,” said Wu Yanxia, a 51-year-old Beijing resident who works at a logistic company. I hope next year will be normal, such as domestic travel.

“We have had a weird year, and it has been hard for both the people and the government.” said Li Feng, a teacher in Beijing.