“WHO is concerned about the risk to life in China and has reiterated the importance of vaccination, including booster doses to protect against hospitalisation, severe disease and death,” he said.
China’s People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s official newspaper, sought to rally worried citizens for what it calls a “final victory” over Covid-19, rebutting criticism of its policy of strict isolation that triggered rare protests last year.
Beijing’s abrupt axing of those ultra-strict curbs last month has unleashed the virus on China’s 1.4 billion people, who have little immunity after being shielded since it emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan three years ago.
Health officials abroad have been struggling to work out the scale of the outbreak and how to stop it spreading, with more countries introducing measures such pre-departure Covid-19 tests for arrivals from China, moves that Beijing has criticised.
European Union health officials meet on Wednesday to discuss a coordinated response to it.
China’s CDC analysis showed a predominance of Omicron lineages BA.5.2 and BF.7 among locally acquired infections, according to the data reported by the WHO.
Omicron is the dominant variant based on recent genomic sequencing, confirming what scientists had already said but allaying concerns for now about a new variant emerging.
02:18
US to require negative Covid test for China arrivals from January 5
However, many Chinese funeral homes and hospitals say they are overwhelmed, and international health experts predict at least 1 million Covid-related deaths in China this year.
China has reported five or fewer deaths a day since the policy U-turn.
“That is totally ridiculous,” 66-year-old Zhang, a Beijing resident who only gave his last name, said of the official toll. “Four of my close relatives died. That’s only from one family. I hope the government will be honest with the people and the rest of the world about what’s really happened here.”
China’s cabinet said on Wednesday it would step up medicine distribution and meet demand from medical institutions, nursing homes and rural areas, state media reported.
Beijing has hit back against some countries demanding visitors from China show pre-departure Covid-19 tests, saying the rules were unreasonable and lacked a scientific basis. Japan, the United States, Australia and several European states are among countries requiring such tests.
Willie Walsh, head of the world’s biggest airline association IATA, criticised such “knee-jerk” measures that he said had not previously stopped the spread of a virus that had hammered airlines which are recovering from the pandemic.
China will stop requiring inbound travellers to quarantine from January 8 but they must be tested before arrival.
China reported five new Covid-19 deaths for Tuesday, bringing the official death toll to 5,258, very low by global standards.
