Tag: COVID-19 Pandemic

washington —  With a major shift in China’s COVID-19 policy, Beijing is putting the focus back on economic growth. To lessen the blow to the domestic economy from the surge of infected people, Chinese officials and companies are letting people who test positive for COVID-19 return to work, even though that could accelerate the spread of the virus. Industrial production in China is continuing to contract in the aftermath of strict coronavirus-related restrictions that disrupted factory activity and supply chains. According to data released by China’s National Bureau of Statistics…

Washington —  The explosion of COVID infections in China since it relaxed its prevention and control measures has experts weighing the risks of new mutations that could prove to be more contagious or deadly that the currently dominant omicron strain. According to an internal estimate from China’s top health officials reported by Bloomberg and the Financial Times, almost 250 million people in China may have caught COVID-19 in the first 20 days of December. Ziyad Al-Aly, director of the Clinical Epidemiology Center at Washington University in St. Louis, told VOA…

Beijing —  Beijing’s sudden pivot away from containing COVID-19 has caused jitters around the world, with the United States saying it may restrict travel from China following its decision to end mandatory quarantine for overseas arrivals. China late Monday scrapped quarantine for inbound travelers from January 8 onwards, dismantling the last remaining piece of its stringent zero-COVID policy and ending some of the world’s harshest border restrictions. The move was greeted with jubilation by Chinese citizens, who rushed to book international flights, triggering a surge in ticket prices. Hospitals and…

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 announcement Tuesday adds to abrupt changes that are rolling back some of the world’s strictest anti-virus controls as President Xi Jinping’s government tries to reverse an economic slump. Rules that confined millions of people to their homes kept China’s infection rate low but…

The U.S. government may impose new COVID-19 measures on travelers to the United States from China over concerns about the “lack of transparent data” coming from Beijing, U.S. officials said on Tuesday. The move comes after Japan, India and Malaysia announced stepped up rules on travelers from China in the last 24 hours, citing a rise in infections there. Japan has said it would require a negative COVID-19 test upon arrival for travelers from China. Malaysia put in place additional tracking and surveillance measures. “There are mounting concerns in the…

Beijing —  People in China reacted with joy and rushed to book flights overseas Tuesday after Beijing said it would scrap mandatory Covid quarantine for overseas arrivals, ending almost three years of self-imposed isolation. In a snap move late Monday, China said from January 8 inbound travelers would no longer be required to quarantine on arrival in a further unwinding of hardline coronavirus controls that had torpedoed its economy and sparked nationwide protests. Cases have surged nationwide as key pillars of the containment policy have fallen away, with authorities acknowledging…