China: No more quarantine for travelers in January

• Hospitals are overcrowded and senior citizens are dying.
• Beijing reported a few deaths and around 4,000 new Covid infections per day.
• Quarantine would be eliminated but PCR test would be mandatory.

The last significant departure from the nation’s zero-Covid policy will take place in China on January 8, according to officials.

This will essentially reopen the country to individuals with employment and study visas as well as those who want to visit relatives after three years of closed borders.

But it comes as China battles the virus’ violent spread following the removal of limitations.

According to reports, hospitals are overcrowded and senior citizens are dying.

Officials have ceased disclosing Covid data, therefore it is now unknown what the exact toll is in terms of daily case counts and fatalities.

Last week, Beijing reported a few deaths and around 4,000 new Covid infections per day.

It said on Sunday that it will no longer post case numbers at all. According to Reuters, however, the British health data business Airfinity claimed that China had more than a million infections and 5,000 fatalities every day.

After three years of lockdowns, closed borders, and required quarantines for Covid cases and contacts, China is the final major economy in the world to transition to “living with Covid.”

The so-called zero-Covid strategy hurt the economy and made people tired of rules and tests that were repeated. President Xi Jinping was targeted in rare public protests in November as a result of public discontent with the programme, and authorities soon abandoned the Covid regulations as a result.

Closed borders are still the fundamental limitation. Since March 2020, entering China has required a three-week minimum mandatory quarantine at a governmental facility. Recently, it was shortened to five days.

On the other hand, Covid was formally reduced to a Class B infectious disease on January 8 according to a statement made by the National Health Commission on Monday.

That meant that quarantine would be eliminated—although entering travellers would still need to undergo a PCR test—as well as a limit on the number of planes permitted into China each day.

Authorities said that they would “optimise” visa policies for foreigners planning to visit, work, or study in China as well as for family gatherings and reunions.

Officials announced the start of a pilot programme for international cruise ships, though it’s unclear if that includes tourist visas.

Many Chinese who can now go abroad again have welcomed the new regulations. Within hours after the announcement, the biggest travel websites in the nation noted an increase in visitors.

However, many have also expressed their rage at the unexpected liberation following years of restrictions.

“It makes me happy but also leaves me incoherent. Why did I have to endure the year’s worth of daily Covid tests and lockdowns if we were going to do this [reopening] anyway?” Shanghai resident Rachel Liu made the statement.

She claimed that even though her family had recently been afflicted with the virus, despite having experienced three months of lockdown in April.

She claimed that last week saw fever outbreaks in her parents, grandparents, and partner, who all reside in three different cities: Xi’an, Shanghai, and Hangzhou.

Concerns about borders reopening as Covid cases peak in China have also been widely expressed online.

“Why can’t we open up when this wave has passed? Older patients won’t be able to survive two infections in a month, and the medical staff is already exhausted “a popular Weibo comment was read.

People in cities like Beijing and Shanghai, which have harsh winters, claim to be running low on cold and flu medications and scrambling to find medical assistance for ailing family members. Since crematoriums are overloaded, it is anticipated that hundreds of deaths may not be registered.

President Xi called on officials to take “feasible” action to save lives in his first remarks on the revisions on Monday. He was quoted by state media as saying that a more focused approach was required since the nation was dealing with a new pandemic control situation.

Analysts claim that Mr. Xi is in a difficult position as a result of China’s U-turn on how it handles the pandemic. Zero-Covid, which many criticised for severely limiting people’s freedoms and harming the economy, was the brainchild of this individual.

Analysts claim that because he abandoned it, he must now accept responsibility for the massive surge of infections and hospital admissions. Why the nation was not more ready has been a subject of much debate.

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