Hong Kong (CNN) – A growing outbreak of Covid in China. Countries that impose travel restrictions on Chinese travelers, are wary of the virus being imported. Scientists warn against fear and xenophobia.
But this is not early 2020. The familiar scene is playing out now as China battles its biggest outbreak ever, having abandoned its strict zero-Covid approach and partially reopened its border in three years into the pandemic.
The country announced this week that it will drop quarantine requirements for international arrivals and resume outbound travel for Chinese citizens, which had previously been banned. It prompted a surge of eager travelers booking flights out of the country, hungry for a trip after several years of isolation – but it also sparked concern among some foreign governments as China’s Covid cases skyrocketed.
Almost half of the 212 passengers who arrived at Italy’s Milan airport from China on Monday tested positive for Covid, a regional health chief said on Wednesday.
But while countries including the US and Japan are moving to impose restrictions, others such as France and Great Britain have made it clear they are ready to welcome Chinese travelers – who, pre-pandemic, had been the main driver international tourism.
China responded by claiming its Covid situation was “under control,” and accused the Western media of “distorting” its recent policy changes.
“The real intention is to sabotage China’s three years of Covid-19 control efforts and attack the country’s system,” state-run tabloid Global Times said in an article on Thursday, citing experts in calling the restrictions “baseless” and “discriminatory.”
Which countries impose testing requirements?
Which countries are imposing testing requirements?
Japan announced on Tuesday that all travelers who have either been to or traveled to mainland China within seven days will be tested on arrival starting Friday, and that the government would limit the number of flights to and from from China. Read also : The expansion of the U.S. Contribution to the World Food Program – United States Department of State.
The country’s prime minister, Fumio Kishida, pointed to the lack of official Chinese government data. “While there is information that the infection is spreading rapidly in mainland China, concern has been growing in Japan as it is difficult to grasp the detailed situation,” he said.
Indian authorities implemented similar guidelines on travelers not only from China, but also several nearby locations including Japan, South Korea and Thailand. The aim of the guidelines is to ensure that Covid does not spread as quickly as it has in China, authorities said on Tuesday.
Taiwan also announced mandatory tests on arrival for travelers coming from mainland China on Wednesday. The self-governing island has banned mainland Chinese tourists since the pandemic, and only allows Chinese citizens to visit for business or family reasons.
In all three places, those found to be positive on arrival will need to quarantine for several days.
The US announced that a negative test result will be required before departure for travelers from China, including Hong Kong and Macao – as well as popular third country gateways such as Seoul, Toronto and Vancouver.
In Europe, Spain and Italy tightened their restrictions. Spain now requires a negative test for Covid-19 or proof of full vaccination for visitors arriving from China, while Italy has brought back mandatory tests. The UK has said it is considering whether to introduce new rules.
People walk with suitcases through a departure lobby at Beijing airport on December 27.
The measures are particularly striking given that most of these places – particularly in the West – have long reopened their borders and abandoned testing requirements as part of the transition to living with covid
In Europe, Italy – the first country on the continent to be hit by a widespread outbreak in 2020 – announced that it would require Covid tests for all travelers coming from China, with the health minister saying it was essential note “any variations. .. in order to protect the population of Italy.”
On Thursday, the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) said China’s surge in cases was not expected to affect the Covid situation in the European Union, and called restrictions on travelers from China “unjust.”
So are variants a risk?
Yanzhong Huang, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, acknowledged the risk of a new variant emerging in “unvaccinated populations. To see also : The United States Should Boost Its Strategy in Latin America, Starting with Chile.”
“Although (in China) they officially have 90% of the population vaccinated with two doses of the inactivated vaccines, you still have a large percentage of the elderly who are not vaccinated … and many of the people who are vaccinated did so more than six months ago, so their antibody levels are already very low,” he said. “So we cannot rule out the possibility that new variants may emerge in China and spread to other parts of the world.”
One US federal health official pointed to the speed of the outbreak in China, saying: “With so many people in China infected in a short period of time, there is a chance and a probability that a new variant will emerge .”
US officials have also expressed concerns about China’s lack of transparency regarding the recent surge in cases, particularly the absence of genome sequencing information that could help detect new strains of the coronavirus.
However, GISEAD, a global virus database, said Chinese authorities had been submitting more genomic information from recent samples – and that these appeared to match the variants already circulating globally. wide
Karen Grepin, an associate professor at the School of Public Health at the University of Hong Kong, said a country’s best defense against possible variations was to focus on domestic policies that protect its own population – such as increasing vaccinations, maintaining social distancing and others. basic public health measures.
“In many parts of the world, the pandemic feels like it’s over… but at the end of the day, (these measures) are ultimately what stop the transmission of the virus,” he said.
“If countries are at the point where they think those things are no longer important, because for example they have developed so much population immunity, then why care about a couple of new cases coming in from China ?”
Are the measures effective?
Despite the potential risk, many health experts have widely criticized the new testing requirements as ineffective at best and alarming at worst. This may interest you : The innovative insurance plan targets the high-tech industry in Lingang.
“I see no convincing reason to justify this move,” said Huang, of the Council on Foreign Relations. “So far we have no evidence to support whether such variations are emerging in mainland China.”
“I can understand concerns because of the lack of transparency, because of the lack of sharing of the genomic sequence,” he added. “But even with a ban, we cannot stop the virus from spreading. And assuming indeed that new variants emerge in mainland China, we would delay the spread, we are not going to stop the virus from spreading to other parts of the world.”
Grepin echoed this point, saying: “In reality, we don’t have the scientific evidence to support the effectiveness of these measures in practice.”
If an infectious variant emerges, it will likely enter the US through other countries anyway, he said, pointing out that there were very few restrictions when Omicron entered the evident last fall.
Pre-departure testing – which the US requires – is also only somewhat effective, as many new variants have a short incubation period, meaning “there will still be cases that will come through,” he added.
Political pressure and xenophobia
Political pressure and xenophobia
There are a few reasons why countries may be imposing these restrictions despite their dubious use, Grepin says – one is the fear that Chinese Covid patients may be fleeing elsewhere for treatment with hospitals at home overwhelmed completely
But, he added, this is quite unlikely. The number of trips coming out of China is still very low, partly due to the limited number of flights. And at the rate that Covid is spreading, it would be a logistical challenge for infected patients to get visas immediately and book flights abroad.
Instead, the recent spate of restrictions is likely to reflect the “political pressure (on authorities) to look like they are doing something,” he said. “We see one country do it and then other countries follow suit.”
Medical staff treat patients at a hospital in Jiangsu, China, on December 28.
CFOTO/Future Publishing/Getty Images
Experts also warn that singling out China could increase the risk of more anti-Chinese racism, as seen early in the pandemic when Asians around the world faced discrimination and violent hate crimes.
China is not the only place to see an increase in cases, Huang said. “I don’t see why China should be treated differently to other countries like Australia, for example, which is swimming in Covid,” he added.
The US is likely importing tens of thousands of cases from around the world even now, Grepin said, adding that 1 to 3% of all international travelers have Covid – so there’s little point targeting Covid coming from one country in particular.
“We’ve seen this throughout the pandemic – when certain measures are targeted at people who come from a certain place, it reinforces stereotypes or beliefs that viruses come from certain parts of the world… it’s simply not true,” she said.
Which countries welcome back Chinese travelers?
Which countries are welcoming Chinese travelers back?
In contrast, many countries have opened their doors in welcome.
The tourism departments and embassies of France, Thailand, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Austria and Switzerland posted messages on Weibo, China’s version of Twitter, inviting Chinese tourists.
“Chinese friends, France welcomes you with open arms!” the French embassy wrote on Weibo. Thailand’s national tourism administration wrote: “Thailand has been waiting for you for three years!”
Many Weibo users celebrated their newfound freedom to travel, with the hashtag “Where to travel abroad next year” garnering nearly 80 million views.
Before the pandemic, China was the world’s largest market for outbound travel, having jumped from 4.5 million travelers in 2000 to 150 million in 2018. The country is also the world’s biggest spender, accounting for $277 billion or 16% of total $1.7 trillion in international tourism spending worldwide, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization.
China alone contributed 51% of the travel and tourism GDP in the Asia-Pacific region in 2018, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council. And Chinese travelers typically accounted for 30% of all arrivals to Thailand.
CNN Cheng, Pierre Meilhan, Kevin Liptak, Valentina Di Donato, Eric Cheung, Emi Jozuka, Gabby Gretener, Lauren Kent and CNN’s Beijing bureau contributed to the reporting.
