China to keep Covid-19 border restrictions for another year

We are not an agent or recuirter, but a headhunter !

June 22 (Reuters)-China plans to keep Covid-19 pandemic border restrictions in place for at least another year amid fears over the emergence of new variants and a calendar of sensitive events, the Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday (June 22), citing people familiar with the matter.

The provisional timeline for the second half of 2022 was set during a meeting of China's cabinet, or State Council, in mid-May.

China sharply reduced transport links with other countries as the coronavirus emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019.

The capital, Beijing, is due to host the Winter Olympics and the Winter Paralympics in February 2022, bringing thousands of participating athletes to the country.

Airlines, both Chinese and non-Chinese, also face the risk of their flight routes being suspended temporarily if a certain number of infected passengers are detected on arrival in China.

Reported daily cases in China are currently far lower than in other major countries but the Chinese government is acutely aware of potential wider transmissions due to its dense urban populations and highly developed transport network.

China reported 25 new confirmed COVID-19 cases in the mainland for June 21, up from 17 infections a day earlier, the health authority said on Tuesday.

Of the new cases, two were local infections in southern Guangdong province, while the rest were imported cases, the National Health Commission said.

The number of new asymptomatic infections rose to 27 from 19 a day earlier. China does not classify them as confirmed cases.

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in mainland China reached 91,629 by the end of June 21, with the death toll unchanged at 4,636.

Here's Why China Still Can’t Open Its Borders

Despite its vaccination program, China cannot yet open its borders, according to one of the country’s top health officials.

Feng Zijian, deputy director general of China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said that even with 60-80% of the population fully vaccinated, opening the borders would still pose the risk of a severe outbreak of COVID-19.

He went on to explain that this is because in China’s largely COVID-free population, there is no way to know if China’s vaccines can prevent onward transmission as well as preventing serious sickness.

Messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines, such as those developed by Pfizer Inc., BioNTech SE and Moderna Inc., appear to prevent onward transmission as has been shown in a number of countries around the world.

CEO of Chinese pharmaceutical company Walvax Biotechnology Co. Li Yunchun, told Bloomberg that the company is developing its own mRNA vaccine. Li said he expects that vaccine to undergo phase three clinical trials in South America, Southeast Asia, South Asia and Central America. Whether or not it will be as effective as mRNA vaccines used in other countries remains to be seen.

According to Our World in Data, China has administered more than 800 million vaccine doses as of June 9. However, it is not clear how many of these are first and second doses. Approval was recently given for children in China as young as three years old to get vaccinated.

In China, residents can receive an inactivated vaccine produced by either Sinopharm or Sinovac. Clinical trials in other countries suggest the vaccines are effective in preventing serious illness caused by COVID-19.

As the COVID-19 pandemic worsened overseas in the early part of 2020, China closed its borders to almost all foreigners at midnight on March 28, 2020. Anyone entering the Chinese mainland from overseas must still undergo strict measures of centralized quarantine and testing. Most places in the mainland require 21 days of centralized quarantine.

The latest news will be disappointing for many. Clearly, there is still a long way to go on the road back to normality. 

Source:

1.https://www.reuters.com/world/china/china-keep-covid-19-border-restrictions-another-year-wsj-2021-06-22;

2.https://www.wsj.com/articles/china-to-keep-covid-19-border-restrictions-for-another-year-11624361777

3.Thatsshanghai, By Alistair Baker-Brian, June 11

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