Tag Archives: OMS

World

WHO urges ‘immediate action’ after cough syrup deaths

Leave a comment

LONDON, Jan 23 (Reuters) – The World Health Organization has called for “immediate and concerted action” to protect children from contaminated medicines after a spate of child deaths linked to cough syrups last year.

In 2022, more than 300 children – mainly aged under 5 – in Gambia, Indonesia and Uzbekistan died of acute kidney injury, in deaths that were associated with contaminated medicines, the WHO said in a statement on Monday.

The medicines, over-the-counter cough syrups, had high levels of diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol.

“These contaminants are toxic chemicals used as industrial solvents and antifreeze agents that can be fatal even taken in small amounts, and should never be found in medicines,” the WHO said.

As well as the countries above, the WHO told Reuters on Monday that the Philippines, Timor Leste, Senegal and Cambodia may potentially be impacted because they may have the medicines on sale. It called for action across its 194 member states to prevent more deaths.

[1/4] Logo of Marion Biotech, a healthcare and pharmaceutical company is seen on a gate outside their office in Noida, India, December 29, 2022. REUTERS/Anushree Fadnavis

“Since these are not isolated incidents, WHO calls on various key stakeholders engaged in the medical supply chain to take immediate and coordinated action,” WHO said.

The WHO has already sent specific product alerts in October and earlier this month, asking for the medicines to be removed from the shelves, for cough syrups made by India’s Maiden Pharmaceuticals and Marion Biotech, which are linked with deaths in Gambia and Uzbekistan respectively.

It also issued a warning last year for cough syrups made by four Indonesian manufacturers, PT Yarindo Farmatama, PT Universal Pharmaceutical, PT Konimex and PT AFI Pharma, that were sold domestically.

The companies involved have either denied that their products have been contaminated or declined to comment while investigations are ongoing.

The WHO reiterated its call for the products flagged above to be removed from circulation, and called more widely for countries to ensure that any medicines for sale are approved by competent authorities. It also asked governments and regulators to assign resources to inspect manufacturers, increase market surveillance and take action where required.

It called on manufacturers to only buy raw ingredients from qualified suppliers, test their products more thoroughly and keep records of the process. Suppliers and distributors should check for signs of falsification and only distribute or sell medicines authorised for use, the WHO added.

Reporting by Jennifer Rigby; Editing by Mark Heinrich and Christina Fincher

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

China COVID peak to last 2-3 months, hit rural areas next -expert

Leave a comment

  • Peak of COVID wave seen lasting 2-3 months – epidemiologist
  • Elderly in rural areas particularly at risk
  • People mobility indicators tick up, but yet to fully recover

BEIJING, Jan 13 (Reuters) – The peak of China’s COVID-19 wave is expected to last two to three months, and will soon swell over the vast countryside where medical resources are relatively scarce, a top Chinese epidemiologist has said.

Infections are expected to surge in rural areas as hundreds of millions travel to their home towns for the Lunar New Year holidays, which officially start from Jan. 21, known before the pandemic as the world’s largest annual migration of people.

China last month abruptly abandoned the strict anti-virus regime of mass lockdowns that fuelled historic protests across the country in late November, and finally reopened its borders this past Sunday.

The abrupt dismantling of restrictions has unleashed the virus onto China’s 1.4 billion people, more than a third of whom live in regions where infections are already past their peak, according to state media.

But the worst of the outbreak was not yet over, warned Zeng Guang, the former chief epidemiologist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, according to a report published in local media outlet Caixin on Thursday.

“Our priority focus has been on the large cities. It is time to focus on rural areas,” Zeng was quoted as saying.

He said a large number of people in the countryside, where medical facilities are relatively poor, are being left behind, including the elderly, the sick and the disabled.

Authorities have said they were making efforts to improve supplies of antivirals across the country. Merck & Co’s (MRK.N) molnupiravir was made available in China from Friday.

The World Health Organization this week also warned of the risks stemming from holiday travelling.

The UN agency said China was heavily under-reporting deaths from COVID, although it is now providing more information on its outbreak.

“Since the outbreak of the epidemic, China has shared relevant information and data with the international community in an open, transparent and responsible manner,” foreign ministry official Wu Xi told reporters.

Health authorities have been reporting five or fewer deaths a day over the past month, numbers which are inconsistent with the long queues seen at funeral homes and the body bags seen coming out of crowded hospitals.

China has not reported COVID fatalities data since Monday. Officials said in December they planned to issue monthly, rather than daily updates, going forward.

Although international health experts have predicted at least 1 million COVID-related deaths this year, China has reported just over 5,000 since the pandemic began, one of the lowest death rates in the world.

DIPLOMATIC TENSIONS

Concerns over data transparency were among the factors that prompted more than a dozen countries to demand pre-departure COVID tests from travellers arriving from China.

Beijing, which had shut its borders from the rest of the world for three years and still demands all visitors get tested before their trip, objects to the curbs.

Wu said accusations by individual countries were “completely unreasonable, unscientific and unfounded.”

Tensions escalated this week with South Korea and Japan, with China retaliating by suspending short-term visas for their nationals. The two countries also limit flights, test travellers from China on arrival, and quarantine the positive ones.

Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on Friday Tokyo will continue to demand transparency, labelling Beijing’s retaliation as extremely “regrettable.”

Parts of China were returning to normal life.

In the bigger cities in particular, residents are increasingly on the move, pointing to a gradual, though so far slow, rebound in consumption and economic activity.

An immigration official said on Friday 490,000 daily trips on average were made in and out of China since it reopened on Jan. 8, only 26% of the pre-pandemic levels.

Singapore-based Chu Wenhong was among those who finally got reunited with their parents for the first time in three years.

“They both got COVID, and are quite old. I feel quite lucky actually, as it wasn’t too serious for them, but their health is not very good,” she said.

CAUTION

While China’s reopening has given a boost to financial assets globally, policymakers around the world worry it may revive inflationary pressures.

However, December’s trade data released on Friday provided reasons to be cautious about China’s recovery pace.

Jin Chaofeng, whose company exports outdoor rattan furniture, said he has no expansion or hiring plans for 2023.

“With the lifting of COVID curbs, domestic demand is expected to improve but not exports,” he said.

Data next week is expected to show China’s economy grew just 2.8% in 2022, its second-slowest since 1976, the final year of Mao Zedong’s decade-long Cultural Revolution, according to a Reuters poll.

Some analysts say last year’s lockdowns will leave permanent scars on China, including by worsening its already bleak demographic outlook.

Growth is then seen rebounding to 4.9% this year, still well below the pre-pandemic trend.

Additional reporting by the Beijing and Shanghai newsrooms; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

Chinese fret over elderly as WHO warns of holiday COVID surge

Leave a comment

  • Two billion trips expected over Lunar New Year
  • Virus spreading from cities to vulnerable villages
  • WHO says China response challenged by lack of data
  • China’s grand reopening marred by Japan, Korea spat

BEIJING, Jan 12 (Reuters) – People in China worried on Thursday about spreading COVID-19 to aged relatives as they planned returns to their home towns for holidays that the World Health Organization warns could inflame a raging outbreak.

The Lunar New Year holiday, which officially starts on Jan. 21, comes after China last month abandoned a strict anti-virus regime of mass lockdowns that prompted widespread frustration and boiled over into historic protests.

That abrupt U-turn unleashed COVID on a population of 1.4 billion which lacks natural immunity, having been shielded from the virus since it first erupted in late 2019, and includes many elderly who are not fully vaccinated.

The outbreak spreading from China’s mega-cities to rural areas with weaker medical resources is overwhelming some hospitals and crematoriums.

With scant official data from China, the WHO on Wednesday said it would be challenging to manage the virus over a holiday period considered the world’s largest annual migration of people.

Other warnings from top Chinese health experts for people to avoid aged relatives during the holidays shot to the most-read item on China’s Twitter-like Weibo on Thursday.

“This is a very pertinent suggestion, return to the home town … or put the health of the elderly first,” wrote one user. Another user said they did not dare visit their grandmother and would leave gifts for her on the doorstep.

“This is almost the New Year and I’m afraid that she will be lonely,” the user wrote.

More than two billion trips are expected across China over the broader Lunar New Year period, which started on Jan. 7 and runs for 40 days, according to the transport ministry. That is double last year’s trips and 70% of those seen in 2019 before the pandemic emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan.

“I will stay at home and avoid going to very crowded places,” said Chen, a 27-year-old documentary filmmaker in Beijing who plans to visit her home town in the eastern province of Zhejiang.

Chen said she would disinfect her hands before meeting elderly relatives, such as her grandmother, who has managed to avoid infection.

LACK OF DATA CRITICISED

The WHO and foreign governments have criticised China for not being forthright about the scale and severity of its outbreak, which has led several countries to impose restrictions on Chinese travellers.

China has been reporting five or fewer deaths a day over the past month, numbers that are inconsistent with the long queues seen at funeral homes. The country did not report COVID deaths data on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Liang Wannian, the head of a COVID expert panel under the national health authority, told reporters that deaths could only be accurately counted after the pandemic was over.

Although international health experts have predicted at least a million COVID-related deaths this year, China has reported just over 5,000 since the pandemic began, a fraction of what other countries have reported as they removed restrictions.

Looking beyond the death toll, investors are betting that China’s reopening will reinvigorate a $17 trillion economy suffering its lowest growth in nearly half a century.

That has lifted Asian stocks to a seven-month peak, strengthened China’s yuan currency against the U.S. dollar and bolstered global oil prices on hopes of fresh demand from the world’s top importer.

China’s growth is likely to rebound to 4.9% in 2023, according to a Reuters poll of economists released on Thursday. GDP likely grew just 2.8% in 2022 as lockdowns weighed on activity and confidence, according to the poll, braking sharply from 8.4% growth in 2021.

TRAVEL CHALLENGES

After three years of isolation from the outside world, China on Sunday dropped quarantine mandates for inbound visitors in a move expected to eventually also stimulate outbound travel.

But concerns about China’s outbreak has prompted more than a dozen countries to demand negative COVID test results from people arriving from China.

Among them, South Korea and Japan have also limited flights and require tests on arrival, with passengers showing up as positive being sent to quarantine.

In a deepening spat between the regional rivals, China has in turn stopped issuing short-term visas and suspended transit visa exemptions for South Korean and Japanese nationals.

Despite Beijing’s lifting of travel curbs, outbound flight bookings from China were at only 15% of pre-pandemic levels in the week after the country announced it would reopen its borders, travel data firm ForwardKeys said on Thursday.

Low airline capacity, high air fares, new pre-flight COVID-19 testing requirements by many countries and a backlog of passport and visa applications pose challenges as the industry looks to recovery, ForwardKeys Vice President Insights Olivier Ponti said in a statement.

Hong Kong Airlines on Thursday said it does not expect to return to capacity until mid-2024.

Reporting by Bernard Orr, Liz Lee, Eduardo Baptista and Jing Wang in Beijing; Writing by John Geddie; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Nick Macfie

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

China imposes transit curbs for S.Korea, Japan in growing COVID spat

Leave a comment

  • New curbs for S.Korea, Japan nationals transiting China
  • China says visa suspensions for S.Korea, Japan “reasonable”
  • Escalating diplomatic spat may complicate economic relations
  • Social media users lash out at S.Korea’s “insulting” COVID curbs

BEIJING, Jan 11 (Reuters) – China introduced transit curbs for South Korean and Japanese nationals on Wednesday, in an escalating diplomatic spat over COVID-19 curbs that is marring the grand re-opening of the world’s second-largest economy after three years of isolation.

China removed quarantine mandates for inbound travellers on Sunday, one of the last vestiges of the world’s strictest regime of COVID restrictions, which Beijing abruptly began dismantling in early December after historic protests.

But worries over the scale and impact of the outbreak in China, where the virus is spreading unchecked, have prompted more than a dozen countries to demand negative COVID test results from people arriving from China.

Among them, South Korea and Japan have also limited flights and require tests on arrival, with passengers showing up as positive being sent to quarantine. In South Korea, quarantine is at the traveller’s own cost.

In response, the Chinese embassies in Seoul and Tokyo said on Tuesday they had suspended issuing short-term visas for travellers to China, with the foreign ministry slamming the testing requirements as “discriminatory.”

That prompted an official protest from Japan to China, while South Korean foreign minister Park Jin said that Seoul’s decision was based on scientific evidence, not discriminatory and that China’s countermeasures were “deeply regrettable.”

In a sign of escalating tensions on Wednesday, China’s immigration authority suspended its transit visa exemptions for South Koreans and Japanese.

The spat may affect economic relations between the three neighbours as well.

Japanese department store operator Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings Ltd (3099.T) and supermarket operator Aeon Co (8267.T) said they may have to rethink personnel transfers to China depending on how long the suspension lasts.

“We won’t be able to make short-term business trips, but such trips had dwindled during COVID anyway, so we don’t expect an immediate impact. But if the situation lasts long, there will be an effect,” said a South Korean chip industry source who declined to be identified, as the person was not authorised to speak to media.

China requires negative test results from visitors from all countries.

COUNTING DEATHS

Some of the governments that announced curbs on travellers from China cited concerns over Beijing’s data transparency.

The World Health Organization has said China was underreporting deaths.

China’s health authorities have been reporting five or fewer deaths a day over the past month, numbers that are inconsistent with the long queues seen at funeral homes. In a first, they did not report COVID fatalities data on Tuesday.

China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Health Commission did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Without mentioning whether daily reporting had been discontinued, Liang Wannian, head of a COVID expert panel under the national health authority, told reporters deaths can only be accurately counted after the pandemic is over.

China should ultimately determine death figures by looking at excess mortality, Wang Guiqiang, the head of the infectious diseases department at Peking University First Hospital said at the same news conference.

Although international health experts have predicted at least one million COVID-related deaths this year, China has reported just over 5,000 since the pandemic began, a fraction of what other countries have reported as they reopened.

China says it has been transparent with its data.

State media said the COVID wave was already past its peak in the provinces of Henan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Sichuan and Hainan, as well as in the large cities of Beijing and Chongqing – home to more than 500 million people combined.

‘INSULTING’

On Wednesday, Chinese state media devoted extensive coverage of what they called as “discriminatory” border rules in South Korea and Japan.

Nationalist tabloid Global Times defended Beijing’s retaliation as a “direct and reasonable response to protect its own legitimate interests, particularly after some countries are continuing hyping up China’s epidemic situation by putting travel restrictions for political manipulation.”

Chinese social media anger mainly targeted South Korea, whose border measures are the strictest among the countries that announced new rules.

Videos circulating online showed special lanes coordinated by soldiers in uniform for arrivals from China at the airport, with travellers given yellow lanyards with QR codes for processing test results.

One user of China’s Twitter-like Weibo said singling out Chinese travellers was “insulting” and akin to “people treated as criminals and paraded on the streets.”

Annual spending by Chinese tourists abroad reached $250 billion before the pandemic, with South Korea and Japan among the top shopping destinations.

Repeated lockdowns have hammered China’s $17 trillion economy. The World Bank estimated its 2022 growth slumped to 2.7%, its second-slowest pace since the mid-1970s after 2020.

It predicted a rebound to 4.3% for 2023, but that is 0.9 percentage points below its June forecast because of the severity of COVID disruptions and weakening external demand.

($1 = 6.7666 Chinese yuan renminbi)

Additional reporting by Beijing Newsroom; Kaori Kaneko, Mari Shiraki and Elaine Lies in Tokyo; Joyce Lee, Hyunsu Yim and Heekyong Yang in Seoul
Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Gerry Doyle and Kim Coghill

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

China retaliates against South Korea’s COVID curbs, says outbreaks past peaks

Leave a comment

  • China embassy decries “discriminatory” S.Korea border rules
  • Some cities say peak of COVID infections was last month
  • Chinese state media criticise Pfizer over Paxlovid price

BEIJING, Jan 10 (Reuters) – Beijing retaliated on Tuesday against South Korea’s COVID-19 curbs on travellers from China, while state media further downplayed the severity of the outbreak in the last major economy to reopen its borders after three years of isolation.

China ditched mandatory quarantines for arrivals and allowed travel to resume across its border with Hong Kong on Sunday, removing the last major restrictions under the “zero-COVID” regime which it abruptly began dismantling in early December after historic protests against the curbs.

But the virus is spreading unchecked among its 1.4 billion people and worries over the scale and impact of its outbreak have prompted South Korea, the United States and other countries to require negative COVID tests from travellers from China.

Although China imposes similar testing requirements for all arrivals, foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told reporters on Tuesday the entry curbs for Chinese travellers were “discriminatory.”

“We will take reciprocal measures,” Wang said, without elaborating.

The Chinese embassy in South Korea has suspended issuing short-term visas for South Korean visitors, it said on Tuesday, the first retaliatory move against nations imposing COVID-19 curbs on travellers from China.

The embassy will adjust the policy subject to the lifting of South Korea’s “discriminatory entry restrictions” against China, it said on its official WeChat account.

Kyodo news agency, quoting multiple travel industry sources, said China has told travel agencies that it has stopped issuing new visas in Japan. An AFP journalist tweeted that the Chinese embassy in Japan released a statement confirming the curbs on Tuesday but removed it from its website within minutes.

With the virus let loose, China has stopped publishing daily infection tallies. It has been reporting five or fewer deaths a day since the policy U-turn, figures that have been disputed by the World Health Organization and are inconsistent with funeral reporting surging demand.

Some governments have raised concerns about Beijing’s data transparency as international experts predict at least 1 million deaths in China this year. Washington has also raised concerns about future potential mutations of the virus.

China dismisses criticism over its data as politically-motivated attempts to smear its “success” in handling the pandemic and said any future mutations are likely to be more infectious but less harmful.

“Since the outbreak, China has had an open and transparent attitude,” the foreign ministry’s Wang said.

PAST THE PEAK

State media downplayed the severity of the outbreak.

An article in Health Times, a publication managed by People’s Daily, the ruling Communist Party’s official newspaper, quoted several officials as saying infections have been declining in the capital Beijing and several Chinese provinces.

Kan Quan, director of the Office of the Henan Provincial Epidemic Prevention and Control, said nearly 90% of people in the central province of 100 million people had been infected as of Jan. 6.

Beijing acting mayor Yin Yong said the capital was also past its peak. Li Pan, from the Municipal Health Commission in the city of Chongqing, said the peak there was reached on Dec. 20.

In the eastern province of Jiangsu, the peak was reached on Dec. 22, while in neighbouring Zheijiang province “the first wave of infections has passed smoothly,” officials said.

Financial markets looked through the latest border curbs as mere inconvenience, with the yuan hitting a nearly five-month high.

Although daily flights in and out of China are still at a tenth of pre-COVID levels, businesses across Asia, from South Korean and Japanese shop owners to Thai tour bus operators and K-pop groups celebrated the prospect of more Chinese tourists.

Chinese shoppers spent $250 billion a year overseas before COVID.

PFIZER CRITICISM

The border rules were not the only COVID conflict brewing in China.

State media lashed out at Pfizer Inc (PFE.N) over the price for its COVID treatment Paxlovid.

“It is not a secret that U.S. capital forces have already accumulated quite a fortune from the world via selling vaccines and drugs, and the U.S. government has been coordinating all along,” nationalist tabloid Global Times said in an editorial.

Pfizer’s Chief Executive Albert Bourla said on Monday the company was in discussions with Chinese authorities about a price for Paxlovid, but not over licensing a generic version in China.

China’s abrupt change of course in COVID policies has caught many hospitals ill-equipped, while smaller cities were left scrambling to secure basic anti-fever drugs.

Yu Weishi, chairman of Youcare Pharmaceutical Group, told Reuters his firm boosted output of its anti-fever drugs five-fold to one million boxes a day in the past month.

Wang Lili, general manager at another pharmaceutical firm, CR Double Crane (600062.SS), told Reuters that intravenous drips were their most in-demand product.

“We are running 24/7,” Wang said.

Reporting by Beijing and Shanghai bureaus; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

Travel curbs rack up as COVID-hit China readies reopening

Leave a comment

  • China to drop quarantine for overseas visitors on Sunday
  • Greece joins nations imposing travel curbs on China
  • Travel rush, holidays could inflame virus outbreak

SHANGHAI/BEIJING, Jan 6 (Reuters) – More countries around the world are demanding that visitors from China take COVID tests, days before it drops border controls and ushers in an eagerly awaited return to travel for a population that has been largely stuck at home for three years.

From Sunday, China will end the requirement for inbound travellers to quarantine, the latest dismantling of its “zero-COVID” regime that began last month following historic protests against a suffocating series of mass lockdowns.

But the abrupt changes have exposed many of China’s 1.4 billion population to the virus for the first time, triggering an infection wave that is overwhelming some hospitals, emptying pharmacy shelves of medication and causing international alarm.

Greece, Germany and Sweden on Thursday joined more than a dozen countries to demand COVID tests from Chinese travellers, as the World Health Organisation said China’s official virus data was under-reporting the true extent of its outbreak.

Chinese officials and state media have struck a defiant tone, defending the handling of the outbreak, playing down the severity of the surge and denouncing foreign travel requirements for its residents.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning warned on Friday of possible reciprocal measures after the European Union recommended pre-departure testing for Chinese passengers.

“The EU should listen more to … rational voices and treat China’s epidemic prevention and control objectively and fairly,” Mao told a regular media briefing in Beijing.

The Global Times, a nationalistic tabloid published by the official People’s Daily, said in an editorial that some Western media and politicians “would never be satisfied” no matter what steps China takes.

The global aviation industry, battered by years of pandemic curbs, has also been critical of the decisions to impose testing on travellers from China. China will still require pre-departure testing for inbound travellers after Jan. 8.

HOSPITALS PACKED

Some Chinese citizens think the reopening has been too hasty.

“They should have taken a series of actions before opening up … and at the very least ensure that the pharmacies were well stocked,” a 70-year-old man who gave his surname as Zhao told Reuters in Shanghai.

China reported five new COVID deaths in the mainland for Thursday, bringing its official virus death toll to 5,264, one of the lowest in the world.

But that appeared to be at odds with the reality on the ground where funeral parlours are overwhelmed and hospitals are packed with elderly patients on respirators. In Shanghai, more than 200 taxi drivers are driving ambulances to meet demand for emergency services, the Shanghai Morning Post reported.

International health experts believe Beijing’s narrow definition of COVID deaths does not reflect a true toll that could rise to more than a million fatalities this year.

Investors are optimistic that China’s reopening can eventually reinvigorate a $17-trillion economy suffering its lowest growth in nearly half a century.

Those hopes, alongside policy measures to help revive its troubled property sector, lifted China’s yuan on Friday.

Meanwhile, both China’s blue-chip CSI300 Index (.CSI300) and the Shanghai Composite Index (.SSEC) have gained more than 2% in the first trading week of the year.

“While the re-opening is likely to be a bumpy affair amid surging COVID-19 cases and increasingly stretched health systems, our economists expect growth momentum across Asia to gather steam, led by China,” Herald van der Linde, HSBC’s head of equity strategy, Asia Pacific, said in a note.

SOUTHEAST ASIA OPEN

With the big Lunar New Year holidays late this month, the mainland is also set to open the border with its special administrative region of Hong Kong on Sunday, for the first time in three years.

Ferry services between the city and the gambling hub of Macau will resume on the same day.

Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific Airways (0293.HK) said on Thursday it would more than double flights to mainland China. Flights to and from China remain at a tiny fraction of pre-COVID levels.

The WHO has warned that the holiday, which starts on Jan. 21 and usually brings the biggest human migration on the planet as people head home from cities to visit families in small towns and villages, could spark another infection wave in the absence of higher vaccination rates and other precautions.

Authorities expect 2.1 billion passenger trips, by road, rail, water and air, over the holiday, double last year’s 1.05 billion journeys during the same period.

The transport ministry has urged people to be cautious to minimise the risk of infection for elderly relatives, pregnant women and infants.

One region poised to be a major beneficiary of China’s opening is Southeast Asia, where countries have not demanded that Chinese visitors take COVID tests.

Except for airline wastewater testing by Malaysia and Thailand for the virus, the region’s 11 nations will treat Chinese travellers like any others.

As many as 76% of Chinese travel agencies ranked Southeast Asia as the top destination when outbound travel resumed, according to a recent survey by trade show ITB China.

Many people in China have taken to social media to announce their travel plans but some remain wary.

“You want to see the world, but the world might not want to see you,” wrote one WeChat user from Tianjin city.

Reporting by Brenda Goh in Shanghai, Bernard Orr, Eduardo Baptista, Martin Pollard and Liz Lee in Beijing, Farah Master in Hong Kong, and Xinghui Kok in Singapore; Writing by John Geddie and Greg Torode; Editing by Robert Birsel and Andrew Heavens

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

China defends its COVID response after WHO, Biden concerns

Leave a comment

  • China says outbreak is controllable
  • WHO says China under-reporting hospital admissions, deaths
  • Official data at odds with packed hospitals, crematoriums
  • Asian shares up on hopes China reopening stimulates growth

BEIJING/SHANGHAI, Jan 5 (Reuters) – China defended on Thursday its handling of its raging COVID-19 outbreak after U.S. President Joe Biden voiced concern and the World Health Organisation (WHO) said Beijing was under-reporting virus deaths.

The WHO’s emergencies director, Mike Ryan, said on Wednesday in some of the U.N. health agency’s most critical remarks to date, that Chinese officials were under-representing data on several fronts.

China scrapped its stringent COVID controls last month after protests against them, abandoning a policy that had shielded its 1.4 billion population from the virus for three years.

China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning told a regular press briefing in Beijing that China had transparently and quickly shared COVID data with the WHO.

Mao said that China’s “epidemic situation is controllable” and that it hoped the WHO would “uphold a scientific, objective, and impartial position”.

“Facts have proved that China has always, in accordance with the principles of legality, timeliness, openness and transparency, maintained close communication and shared relevant information and data with the WHO in a timely manner,” Mao said.

China reported one new COVID death in the mainland for Wednesday, compared with five a day earlier, bringing its official death toll to 5,259.

Ryan said on Wednesday the numbers China was publishing under-represented hospital admissions, intensive care unit patients and deaths.

Hours later, U.S. President Joe Biden also raised concern about China’s handling of a COVID outbreak that is filling hospitals and overwhelming some funeral homes.

“They’re very sensitive … when we suggest they haven’t been that forthcoming,” Biden told reporters while on a visit to Kentucky.

The French health minister voiced similar fears while German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach voiced concern about a new COVID subvariant linked to growing hospitalisations in the northeastern United States.

CROWDED HOSPITAL

The United States is one of more than a dozen countries that have imposed restrictions on travellers from China.

China has criticised such border controls as unreasonable and unscientific and the government said on Thursday that its border with its special administrative region of Hong Kong would also reopen on Sunday, for the first time in three years.

Millions of people will be travelling within China later this month for the Lunar New Year holiday.

China’s government has played down the severity of the situation in recent days and the state-run Global Times said in an article on Wednesday that COVID had peaked in several cities including the capital, Beijing, citing interviews with doctors.

But at a hospital in Shanghai’s suburban Qingpu district, patients on beds lined the corridors of the emergency treatment area and main lobby on Thursday, most of them elderly and several breathing with oxygen tanks, a Reuters witness said.

A notice on a board advised that patients would have to wait an average of five hours to be seen.

Staff declared one elderly patient dead and pinned a note to the body on the floor stating the cause of death “respiratory failure”.

Police patrolled outside a nearby crematorium, where a stream of mourners carried wreathes and waited to collect the ashes of loved ones.

DATA GAPS

With one of the lowest official COVID death tolls in the world, China has been routinely accused of under-reporting for political reasons.

In December last year, the WHO said it had received no data from China on new COVID hospitalisations since Beijing lifted its zero-COVID policy.

In its latest weekly report, the WHO said China reported 218,019 new weekly COVID cases as of Jan. 1, adding that gaps in data might be due to authorities simply struggling to tally cases.

The methods for counting COVID deaths have varied across countries since the pandemic first erupted in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019.

Chinese health officials have said only deaths caused by pneumonia and respiratory failure in patients who had the virus are classified as COVID deaths.

But disease experts outside China have said its approach would miss several other widely recognised types of fatal COVID complications, from blood clots to heart attacks as well as sepsis and kidney failure.

International health experts predict at least 1 million COVID-related deaths in China this year without urgent action. British-based health data firm Airfinity has estimated about 9,000 people in China are probably dying each day from COVID.

Surging COVID infections are hurting demand in China’s $17 trillion economy, with a private-sector survey on Thursday showing services activity shrank in December.

But investors remain optimistic that China’s dismantling of COVID controls will eventually help revive growth that has slid to its lowest rate in nearly half a century. Those hopes were seen lifting Asian equity markets (.MIAPJ0000PUS) on Thursday.

“China reopening has a big impact … worldwide,” said Joanne Goh, an investment strategist at DBS Bank in Singapore, adding the move would spur tourism and consumption and ease supply-chain crunches seen last year.

(This story has been refiled to correct punctuation in headline.)

Reporting by Liz Lee, Eduardo Baptista and Bernard Orr in Beijing, Brenda Goh in Shanghai, Tom Westbrook in Singapore, Steve Holland in Hebron, Kentucky; Writing by John Geddie and Greg Torode; Editing by Robert Birsel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

China pledges ‘final victory’ over COVID as outbreak raises global alarm

Leave a comment

  • Virus spreading fast in China after policy U-turn
  • Japan latest country requiring tests from China arrivals
  • EU meeting to discuss China travel policy
  • WHO seeking data from Chinese scientists

BEIJING, Jan 4 (Reuters) – Global health officials tried to determine the facts of China’s raging COVID-19 outbreak and how to prevent a further spread as the government’s mouthpiece newspaper on Wednesday rallied citizens for a “final victory” over the virus.

China’s axing of its stringent virus curbs last month has unleashed COVID on a 1.4 billion population that has little natural immunity having been shielded from the virus since it emerged in its Wuhan city three years ago.

Funeral homes have reported a spike in demand for their services, hospitals are packed with patients, and international health experts predict at least one million deaths in China this year.

But officially, China has reported a small number of COVID deaths since the policy U-turn and has played down concerns about a disease that it was previously at pains to eradicate through mass lockdowns even as the rest of the world opened up.

“China and the Chinese people will surely win the final victory against the epidemic,” Chinese Communist Party mouthpiece the People’s Daily said in an editorial, rebutting criticism of its tough anti-virus regime that triggered historic protests late last year.

As it now dismantles those restrictions, China has been particularly critical of decisions by some countries to impose a requirement for a COVID test on its citizens, saying they are unreasonable and lack scientific basis.

Japan became the latest country to mandate pre-departure COVID testing for travellers from China, following similar measures by the United States, Britain, South Korea and others.

Health officials from the 27-member European Union are due to meet on Wednesday to discuss a coordinated response to China travel. Most European Union countries favour pre-departure COVID testing for visitors from China.

China, which has been largely shut off from the world since the pandemic began in late 2019, will stop requiring inbound travellers to quarantine from Jan. 8. But it will still demand that arriving passengers get tested before they begin their journeys.

DOUBT ON DATA

Meanwhile, World Health Organization officials met Chinese scientists on Tuesday amid concern over the accuracy of China’s data on the spread and evolution of its outbreak.

The U.N. agency had invited the scientists to present detailed data on viral sequencing and to share data on hospitalizations, deaths and vaccinations.

The WHO would release information about the talks later, probably at a Wednesday briefing, its spokesperson said. The spokesperson earlier said the agency expected a “detailed discussion” about circulating variants in China, and globally.

Last month, Reuters reported that the WHO had not received data from China on new COVID hospitalisations since Beijing’s policy shift, prompting some health experts to question whether it might be concealing the extent of its outbreak.

China reported five new COVID-19 deaths for Tuesday, compared with three a day earlier, bringing the official death toll to 5,258, very low by global standards.

But the toll is widely believed to be much higher. British-based health data firm Airfinity has said about 9,000 people in China are probably dying each day from COVID.

There were chaotic scenes at Shanghai’s Zhongshan hospital where patients, many of them elderly, jostled for space on Tuesday in packed halls between makeshift beds where people used oxygen ventilators and got intravenous drips.

With COVID disruptions slowing China’s $17 trillion economy to its lowest growth in nearly half a century, investors are now hoping policymakers will intervene to counter the slide.

China’s yuan hovered at a four-month high against the dollar on Wednesday, after its finance minister pledged to step up fiscal expansion this year, days after the central bank said it would implement more policy support for the economy.

BOOKING BOOM

Despite some countries imposing restrictions on Chinese visitors, interest in outbound travel from the world’s most populous country is cranking up, state media reported.

Bookings for international flights from China have risen by 145% year-on-year in recent days, the government-run China Daily newspaper reported, citing data from travel platform Trip.com.

The number of international flights to and from China is still a fraction of pre-COVID levels. The government has said it will increase flights and make it easier for people to travel abroad.

Thailand, a major destination for Chinese tourists, is expecting at least five million Chinese arrivals this year, its tourism authority said on Tuesday.

More than 11 million Chinese tourists visited Thailand in 2019, nearly a third of its total visitors.

But there are already signs that an increase in travel from China could pose problems abroad.

South Korea, which began testing travellers from China for COVID on Monday, said more than a fifth of the test results were positive.

Authorities there were hunting on Wednesday for one Chinese national who tested positive but went missing while awaiting quarantine. The person, who was not identified, could face up to a year in prison or fines of 10 million won ($7,840).

Reporting by Bernard Orr and Liz Lee in Beijing and Brenda Goh in Shanghai, Hyonhee Shin in Seoul and Kantaro Komiya in Tokyo; Writing by John Geddie; Editing by Robert Birsel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

Hearses queue at Beijing crematorium, even as China reports no new COVID deaths

Leave a comment

  • Queue of hearses outside Beijing crematorium
  • China reports no new deaths; some criticise its accounting
  • Beijing faces surge in severe COVID in next two weeks – expert

BEIJING, Dec 21 (Reuters) – Dozens of hearses queued outside a Beijing crematorium on Wednesday, even as China reported no new COVID-19 deaths in its growing outbreak, sparking criticism of its virus accounting as the capital braces for a surge of cases.

Following widespread protests, the country of 1.4 billion people this month began dismantling its unpopular “zero-COVID” regime of lockdowns and testing that had largely kept the virus under control for three years though at great economic and psychological cost.

The abrupt change of policy has caught a fragile health system unprepared and hospitals are scrambling for beds and blood, pharmacies for drugs, and authorities are racing to build special clinics. Experts predict China could face more than a million COVID deaths next year.

At a crematorium in Beijing’s Tongzhou district, a Reuters witness saw a queue of about 40 hearses waiting to enter while the parking lot was full.

Inside, family and friends, many wearing traditional white clothing and headbands of mourning, gathered around about 20 coffins awaiting cremation. Staff wore hazmat suits and smoke rose from five of the 15 furnaces.

There was a heavy police presence outside the crematorium.

Reuters could not verify whether the deaths were caused by COVID.

Some Beijing residents have to wait for days to cremate relatives or pay steep fees to secure faster service, funeral home workers said.

A worker at one Beijing funeral parlour posted on social media an offer of “speedy arrangement of hearses, no queue for cremation” for a fee of 26,000 yuan ($3,730).

Reuters could not verify the offer.

‘2020 MINDSET’

China uses a narrow definition of COVID deaths and reported no new fatalities for Tuesday, even crossing one off its overall tally since the pandemic began, now at 5,241 – a fraction of the tolls of many much less populous countries.

The National Health Commission said on Tuesday only deaths caused by pneumonia and respiratory failure in patients who had the virus are classified as COVID deaths.

Benjamin Mazer, an assistant professor of pathology at Johns Hopkins University, said that classification would miss “a lot of cases”, especially as people who are vaccinated, including with Chinese shots, are less likely to die of pneumonia.

Blood clots, heart problems and sepsis – an extreme body response to infection – have caused countless deaths among COVID patients around the world.

“It doesn’t make sense to apply this sort of March 2020 mindset where it’s only COVID pneumonia that can kill you,” Mazer said.

“There’s all sorts of medical complications.”

‘ACT QUICKLY’

The death toll might rise sharply in the near future, with the state-run Global Times newspaper citing a Chinese respiratory expert predicting a spike in severe cases in Beijing over the coming weeks.

“We must act quickly and prepare fever clinics, emergency and severe treatment resources,” Wang Guangfa, a respiratory specialist from Peking University First Hospital, told the newspaper.

Wang expected the COVID wave to peak in late January, with life likely to return to normal by late February or early March.

The NHC also played down international concern about the possibility of virus mutations, saying the likelihood of new strains that are more pathogenic was low.

Paul Tambyah, President of the Asia Pacific Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infection, supported that view.

“I do not think that this is a threat to the world,” he said. “The chances are that the virus will behave like every other human virus and adapt to the environment in which it circulates by becoming more transmissible and less virulent.”

Several prominent scientists and World Health Organization advisers told Reuters a potentially devastating wave to come in China means it may be too early to declare the end of the global pandemic emergency.

SICK WORKERS

Some U.S. and European officials have offered to help mitigate a crisis they fear will hurt the global economy and disrupt supply chains.

From the epicentre in northern China, infections are spreading to manufacturing belts, including the Yangtze River Delta, near Shanghai, disrupting workforces.

Retail and financial service businesses have been hard hit by staff shortages, with factories not far behind, industry bodies say.

Staff at Communist Party and government institutions or enterprises in the southwestern city of Chongqing who have mild COVID symptoms can go to work if they wear a mask, state-run China Daily reported.

Other media reported similar decisions in other cities.

China is still largely cut off from the outside world with COVID restrictions on international travel but there are signs those rules too are easing.

Chelsea Xiang, 35, said she only needed to do two days of quarantine in southwestern city of Chengdu after returning from Hong Kong on Sunday, rather than the minimum five officially required.

“I feel I have my human rights again,” Xiang said.

Reporting by Thomas Peter, Alessandro Diviggiano, Albee Zhang, Bernard Orr, Martin Pollard, Eduardo Baptista, Joe Cash and Ryan Woo in Beijing, Casey Hall in Shanghai, Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago and Chen Lin in Singapore; Writing by Marius Zaharia;
Editing by Lincoln Feast, Robert Birsel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here

World

China races to install hospital beds as COVID surge sparks concern abroad

Leave a comment

  • Authorities rush to add hospital beds, build fever clinics
  • U.S. raises concerns over possibility of COVID mutations
  • Beijing reports five more deaths on Tuesday
  • Security tight at crematoriums amid doubts over death toll

BEIJING/WASHINGTON, Dec 20 (Reuters) – Cities across China scrambled to install hospital beds and build fever screening clinics on Tuesday as the United States said Beijing’s surprise decision to let the virus run free was a concern for the world.

China this month began dismantling its stringent “zero-COVID” regime of mass lockdowns after protests against curbs that had largely kept the virus at bay for three years but at significant costs to society and the world’s second-largest economy.

Now, as the virus sweeps through a country of 1.4 billion people who lack natural immunity having been shielded for so long, there is growing concern about possible deaths, virus mutations and the impact on the economy and trade.

“We know that any time the virus is spreading, that it is in the wild, that it has the potential to mutate and to pose a threat to people everywhere,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price said on Monday, adding that the virus outbreak in China was also a concern for global growth.

Beijing reported five COVID-related deaths on Tuesday, following two on Monday, which were the first fatalities reported in weeks. In total, China has reported just 5,242 COVID deaths since the pandemic emerged in the central city of Wuhan in late 2019, a very low toll by global standards.

But there are rising doubts that the statistics are capturing the full impact of a disease ripping through cities after China dropped curbs including most mandatory testing on Dec. 7.

Since then, some hospitals have become inundated, pharmacies emptied of medicines, while many people have gone into self-imposed lockdowns, straining delivery services.

“It’s a bit of a burden to suddenly reopen when the supply of medications was not sufficiently prepared,” said Zhang, a 31-year-old delivery worker in Beijing who declined to give his full name. “But I support the reopening.”

Some health experts estimate 60% of people in China – equivalent to 10% of the world’s population – could be infected over coming months, and that more than 2 million could die.

In the capital, Beijing, security guards patrolled the entrance of a designated COVID-19 crematorium where Reuters journalists on Saturday saw a long line of hearses and workers in hazmat suits carrying the dead inside. Reuters could not establish if the deaths were due to COVID.

‘GETTING SICK’

In Beijing, which has emerged as the main infection hot spot, commuters, many coughing into their masks, were back on the trains to work and streets were coming back to life after being largely deserted last week.

Streets in Shanghai, where COVID transmission rates are catching up with Beijing’s, were emptier, and subway trains were only half-full.

“People are staying away because they are sick or they are scared of getting sick, but mostly now, I think it’s because they are actually sick,” said Yang, a trainer at a nearly empty Shanghai gym.

Top health officials have softened their tone on the threat posed by the disease in recent weeks, a U-turn from previous messaging that the virus had to be eradicated to save lives even as the rest of the world opened up.

They have also been playing down the possibility that the now predominant Omicron strain could become more virulent.

“The probability of a sudden large mutation … is very low,” Zhang Wenhong, a prominent infectious disease specialist, told a forum on Sunday in comments reported by state media.

Nevertheless, there are mounting signs the virus is buffeting China’s fragile health system.

Cities are ramping up efforts to expand intensive care units and other facilities for severe COVID cases, the state-run Global Times reported on Monday.

Authorities have also been racing to build so-called fever clinics, facilities where medical staff check patients’ symptoms and administer medication. Often attached to hospitals, the clinics are common in mainland China and are designed to prevent the wider spread of contagious disease in hospitals.

In the past week, major cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, and Wenzhou announced they had added hundreds of fever clinics, some in converted sports facilities.

The virus is also hammering China’s economy, expected to grow 3% this year, its worst performance in nearly half a century. Workers and truck drivers falling ill are slowing down output and disrupting logistics, economists say.

A World Economics survey showed on Monday China’s business confidence fell in December to its lowest since January 2013.

Weaker industrial activity in the world’s top oil importer has capped gains for crude prices and driven copper lower.

China kept benchmark lending interest rates unchanged for the fourth consecutive month on Tuesday.

Reporting by Bernard Orr and Xiaoyu Yin in Beijing, David Stanway in Shanghai and Humeyra Pamuk in Washington; Writing by John Geddie and Marius Zaharia; Editing by Robert Birsel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read original article here