Tag Archives: VACCIN

Health

U.S. CDC still looking at potential stroke risk from Pfizer bivalent COVID shot

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Jan 26 (Reuters) – New data from one U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) database shows a possible stroke risk link for older adults who received an updated Pfizer (PFE.N)/BioNTech (22UAy.DE) COVID-19 booster shot, but the signal is weaker than what the agency had flagged earlier in January, health officials said on Thursday.

U.S. Food and Drug Administration officials said they had not detected a link between the shots and strokes in two other safety monitoring databases.

The new data was presented at a meeting of outside experts that advise the FDA on vaccine policy.

Earlier this month, U.S. health officials said they had detected the possible link to ischemic strokes in people over age 65 who received the newer booster shots in its Vaccine Safety Datalink (VSD) database. They said at the time it was very unlikely to represent a true clinical risk.

Dr. Nicola Klein of healthcare company Kaiser Permanente, which maintains VSD data for the CDC, said the rate of strokes observed in the database had slowed in recent weeks, but the signal was still statistically significant, meaning likely not by chance.

Most of the confirmed cases had also received a flu vaccine at the same time, which might be a factor, she said.

FDA scientist Richard Forshee said the agency plans to study whether there is any increased risk of stroke from receiving the two shots at the same time.

Both agencies still recommend older adults receive the booster shots, now tailored to target Omicron variants as well as the original coronavirus.

Dr. Walid Gellad, professor of medicine at University of Pittsburgh, said the issue required further investigation.

“Sometimes signals are not clear,” Gellad said in an email. “It makes sense to look into it more, and it doesn’t make sense to change practice given the known benefits (of getting the booster) in this age group.”

(This story has been corrected to fix the name to Nicola from Nicole in paragraph 5)

Reporting by Michael Erman; Editing by Bill Berkrot

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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China’s ‘great migration’ kicks-off under shadow of COVID

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SHANGHAI, Jan 7 (Reuters) – China on Saturday marked the first day of “chun yun”, the 40-day period of Lunar New Year travel known pre-pandemic as the world’s largest annual migration of people, bracing for a huge increase in travellers and the spread of COVID-19 infections.

This Lunar New Year public holiday, which officially runs from Jan. 21, will be the first since 2020 without domestic travel restrictions.

Over the last month China has seen the dramatic dismantling of its “zero-COVID” regime following historic protests against a policy that included frequent testing, restricted movement, mass lockdowns and heavy damage to the world’s No.2 economy.

Investors are hoping that the reopening will eventually reinvigorate a $17-trillion economy suffering its lowest growth in nearly half a century.

But the abrupt changes have exposed many of China’s 1.4 billion population to the virus for the first time, triggering a wave of infections that is overwhelming some hospitals, emptying pharmacy shelves of medicines and causing long lines to form at crematoriums.

The Ministry of Transport said on Friday that it expects more than 2 billion passengers to take trips over the next 40 days, an increase of 99.5% year-on-year and reaching 70.3% of trip numbers in 2019.

There was mixed reaction online to that news, with some comments hailing the freedom to return to hometowns and celebrate the Lunar New Year with family for the first time in years.

Many others, however, said they would not travel this year, with worry of infecting elderly relatives a common theme.

“I dare not go back to my hometown, for fear of bringing the poison back,” said one such comment on the Twitter-like Weibo.

There are widespread concerns that the great migration of workers in cities to their hometowns will cause a surge in infections in smaller towns and rural areas that are less well-equipped with ICU beds and ventilators to deal with them.

Authorities say they are boosting grassroots medical services, opening more rural fever clinics and instituting a “green channel” for high risk patients, especially elderly people with underlying health conditions, to be transferred from villages directly to higher level hospitals.

“China’s rural areas are wide, the population is large, and the per capita medical resources are relatively insufficient,” National Health Commission spokesman Mi Feng said on Saturday.

“It’s necessary to provide convenient services, accelerate vaccination for the elderly in rural areas and the construction of grassroots lines of defense.”

INFECTION PEAK REACHED

Some analysts are now saying the current wave of infections may have already peaked.

Ernan Cui, an analyst at Gavekal Dragonomics in Beijing, cited several online surveys as indicating that rural areas were already more widely exposed to COVID infections than initially thought, with an infection peak already reached in most regions, noting there was “not much difference between urban and rural areas.”

On Sunday China will reopen its border with Hong Kong and will also end a requirement for travellers coming from abroad to quarantine. That effectively opens the door for many Chinese to travel abroad for the first time since borders slammed shut nearly three years ago, without fear of having to quarantine on their return.

Jillian Xin, who has three children and who lives in Hong Kong, said she was “incredibly excited” about the border opening, especially as it means seeing family in Beijing more easily.

“For us, the border opening means my kids can finally meet their grandparents for the first time since the pandemic began,” she said. “Two of our children have never been able to see their grandpa, so we cannot wait for them to meet.”

China’s surge in cases has caused concern internationally and more than a dozen countries are now demanding COVID tests from travellers from China. The World Health Organisation said on Wednesday that China’s COVID data underrepresents the number of hospitalisations and deaths from the disease.

Chinese officials and state media have defended the handling of the outbreak, playing down the severity of the surge and denouncing foreign travel requirements for its residents.

On Saturday in Hong Kong, people who had made appointments had to queue for about 90 minutes at a centre for PCR tests needed for travel to countries including mainland China.

TREATMENT TO THE FORE

For much of the pandemic, China poured resources into a vast PCR testing program to track and trace COVID-19 cases, but the focus is now shifting to vaccines and treatment.

In Shanghai, for example, the city government on Friday announced an end to free PCR tests for residents from Jan. 8.

A circular published by four government ministries Saturday signalled a reallocation of financial resources to treatment, outlining a plan for public finances to subsidise 60% of treatment costs until March 31.

Meanwhile, sources told Reuters that China is in talks with Pfizer Inc (PFE.N) to secure a licence that will allow domestic drugmakers to manufacture and distribute a generic version of the U.S. firm’s COVID antiviral drug Paxlovid in China.

Many Chinese have been attempting to buy the drug abroad and have it shipped to China.

On the vaccine front, China’s CanSino Biologics Inc (6185.HK) announced it has begun trial production for its COVID mRNA booster vaccine, known as CS-2034.

China has relied on nine domestically-developed vaccines approved for use, including inactivated vaccines, but none have been adapted to target the highly-transmissible Omicron variant and its offshoots currently in circulation.

The overall vaccination rate in the country is above 90%, but the rate for adults who have had booster shots drops to 57.9%, and to 42.3% for people aged 80 and older, according to government data released last month.

China reported three new COVID deaths in the mainland for Friday, bringing its official virus death toll since the pandemic began to 5,267, one of the lowest in the world.

International health experts believe Beijing’s narrow definition of COVID deaths does not reflect a true toll, and some predict more than a million deaths this year.

Reporting by Casey Hall in Shanghai, Julie Zhu in Hong Kong and Kevin Huang
Additional reporting by Jindong Zhang
Editing by Tony Munroe and Frances Kerry

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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World

China state media plays down COVID wave severity before WHO meet

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  • State media says severe illness from COVID is rare
  • Chinese scientists expected to brief WHO
  • China factory activity shrinks in December

BEIJING, Jan 3 (Reuters) – China’s state media played down the severity on Tuesday of the COVID-19 wave surging over the country, with its scientists expected to give a briefing to the World Health Organization on the evolution of the virus later in the day.

China’s abrupt U-turn on COVID controls on Dec. 7, as well as the accuracy of its case and mortality data, have come under increasing scrutiny at home and overseas and prompted some countries to impose travel curbs.

The policy shift followed protests over the “zero COVID” approach championed by President Xi Jinping, marking the strongest show of public defiance in his decade-old presidency and coinciding with the slowest growth in China in nearly half a century.

As the virus spreads unchecked, funeral parlours report a spike in demand for their services and international health experts predict at least one million deaths in the world’s most populous country this year.

China reported three new COVID deaths for Monday, up from one for Sunday. Its official death toll since the pandemic began now stands at 5,253.

In an article on Tuesday, People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party, cited several Chinese experts as saying the illness caused by the virus was relatively mild for most people.

“Severe and critical illnesses account for 3% to 4% of infected patients currently admitted to designated hospitals in Beijing,” Tong Zhaohui, Vice President of Beijing Chaoyang Hospital, told the newspaper.

Kang Yan, head of West China Tianfu Hospital of Sichuan University, said that in the past three weeks, a total of 46 critically ill patients have been admitted to intensive care units, accounting for about 1% of symptomatic infections.

More than 80% of those living in the southwestern Sichuan province have been infected, local health authorities said.

The World Health Organization on Friday urged China’s health officials to regularly share specific and real-time information on the COVID situation.

The agency has invited Chinese scientists to present detailed data on viral sequencing at a meeting of a technical advisory group scheduled for Tuesday. It has also asked China to share data on hospitalizations, deaths and vaccinations.

The European Union has offered free COVID vaccines to China to help contain the outbreak, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday.

EU government health officials will hold talks on Wednesday on a coordinated response to China’s outbreak, the Swedish EU presidency said on Monday.

The United States, France, Australia, India and others will require mandatory COVID tests on travellers from China, while Belgium said it will test wastewater from planes from China for new COVID variants.

China has rejected criticism of its COVID data and said any new mutations may be more infectious but less harmful.

“According to the political logic of some people in Europe and the United States, whether China opens or does not open is equally the wrong thing to do,” state-run CCTV said in a commentary late on Monday.

ECONOMIC CONCERNS

As Chinese workers and shoppers are falling ill, concerns mount about growth prospects in the world’s second-largest economy, weighing on Asian stocks.

Data on Tuesday showed China’s factory activity shrank at a sharper pace in December as the COVID wave disrupted production and hurt demand.

December shipments from Foxconn’s (2317.TW) Zhengzhou iPhone plant, disrupted late last year by a COVID outbreak that prompted worker departures and unrest, were 90% of the firm’s initial plans, a source with direct knowledge of the matter said.

A “bushfire” of infections in China in coming months is likely to hurt its economy this year and drag on global growth, said the head of the International Monetary Fund, Kristalina Georgieva.

“China is entering the most dangerous weeks of the pandemic,” warned analysts at Capital Economics.

“The authorities are making almost no efforts now to slow the spread of infections and, with the migration ahead of Lunar New Year getting started, any parts of the country not currently in a major COVID wave will be soon.”

Mobility data suggested that economic activity was depressed nationwide and would likely remain so until the infection wave began to subside, they added.

China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism said the domestic tourism market saw 52.71 million trips during the New Year holiday, flat year-on-year and only 43% of the 2019 levels, before the pandemic.

The revenue generated was over 26.52 billion yuan ($3.84 billion), up 4% year-on-year but only about 35% of the revenue created in 2019, the ministry said.

Expectations are higher for China’s biggest holiday, the Lunar New Year, later this month, when some experts expect daily COVID cases to have already peaked in many parts of the country. Some hotels in the southern tourist resort of Sanya are fully booked for the period, Chinese media reported.

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

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COVID travel curbs against Chinese visitors ‘discriminatory’ -state media

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  • U.S., Japan, others require COVID tests from Chinese visitors
  • China state media calls COVID travel curbs “discriminatory”
  • China’s factory activity likely cooled in December -poll

BEIJING, Dec 30 (Reuters) – Chinese state-media said COVID-19 testing requirements imposed around the world in response to a surging wave of infections were “discriminatory”, in the clearest pushback yet against restrictions that are slowing down its re-opening.

Having kept its borders all but shut for three years, imposing a strict regime of lockdowns and relentless testing, China abruptly reversed course toward living with the virus on Dec. 7, and a wave of infections erupted across the country.

Some places have been taken aback by the scale of China’s outbreak and expressed scepticism over Beijing’s COVID statistics, with the United States, South Korea, India, Italy, Japan and Taiwan imposing COVID tests for travellers from China.

Malaysia said it would screen all international arrivals for fever.

“The real intention is to sabotage China’s three years of COVID-19 control efforts and attack the country’s system,” state-run tabloid Global Times said in an article late on Thursday, calling the restrictions “unfounded” and “discriminatory.”

China will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8. But it will still demand a negative PCR test result within 48 hours before departure.

Italy on Thursday urged the rest of the European Union to follow its lead, but France, Germany and Portugal have said they saw no need for new restrictions, while Austria has stressed the economic benefits of Chinese tourists’ return to Europe.

Global spending by Chinese visitors was worth more than $250 billion a year before the pandemic.

The United States have raised concerns about potential mutations of the virus as it sweeps through the world’s most populous country, as well as over China’s data transparency.

The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention is considering sampling wastewater from international aircraft to track any emerging new variants, the agency told Reuters.

China, a country of 1.4 billion people, reported one new COVID death for Thursday, same as the day before – numbers which do not match the experience of other countries after they re-opened.

China’s official death toll of 5,247 since the pandemic began compares with more than 1 million deaths in the United States. Chinese-ruled Hong Kong, a city of 7.4 million, has reported more than 11,000 deaths.

UK-based health data firm Airfinity said on Thursday around 9,000 people in China are probably dying each day from COVID. Cumulative deaths in China since Dec. 1 have likely reached 100,000, with infections totalling 18.6 million, it said.

‘EXCESS MORTALITY’

China’s chief epidemiologist Wu Zunyou said on Thursday that a team at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention will measure the difference between the number of deaths in the current wave of infections and the number of deaths expected had the epidemic never happened. By calculating the “excess mortality”, China will be able to work out what could have been potentially underestimated, Wu said.

China has said it only counts deaths of COVID patients caused by pneumonia and respiratory failure as COVID-related.

The relatively low death count is also inconsistent with the surging demand reported by funeral parlours in several Chinese cities.

The lifting of restrictions, after widespread protests against them in November, has overwhelmed hospitals and funeral homes across the country, with scenes of people on intravenous drips by the roadside and lines of hearses outside crematoria fuelling public concern.

Health experts say China has been caught ill-prepared by the U-turn in policies long championed by President Xi Jinping.

In December, tenders put out by hospitals for key equipment such as ventilators and patient monitors were two to three times higher than in previous months, according to a Reuters review，suggesting hospitals were scrambling to plug shortages.

Experts say the elderly in rural areas may be particularly vulnerable because of inadequate medical resources. Next month’s Lunar New Year festival, when hundreds of millions travel to their hometowns, will add to the risk.

ECONOMIC WOES

The world’s second-largest economy is expected to slow down further in the near term as factory workers and shoppers fall ill. Some economists predict a strong bounce back from a low base next year, but concerns linger that some of the damage made by three years of restrictions could be long-term.

Consumers may need time to recover their confidence and spending appetite after losing income during lockdowns, while the private sector may have used its expansion funds to cover losses incurred due to the restrictions.

Heavily indebted China will also face slowing demand in its main export markets, while its massive property sector is licking its wounds after a series of defaults.

China’s factory activity most likely cooled in December as rising infections began to affect production lines, a Reuters poll showed on Friday.

Chinese airlines, however, look set to be the early winners of the re-opening.

Writing by Marius Zaharia. Editing by Gerry Doyle

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China’s vast countryside in rush to bolster COVID defences

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  • Hospitals, funeral parlours overwhelmed by COVID wave
  • Some countries impose testing rules on Chinese travellers
  • China reports one new COVID death for Dec. 28

SHANGHAI/BEIJING, Dec 29 (Reuters) – China’s sprawling and thinly resourced countryside is racing to beef up medical facilities before hundreds of millions of factory workers return to their families for the Lunar New Year holiday next month from cities where COVID-19 is surging.

Having imposed the world’s strictest COVID regime of lockdowns and relentless testing for three years, China reversed course this month towards living with the virus, leaving its fragile health system overwhelmed.

The lifting of restrictions, following widespread protests against them, means COVID is spreading largely unchecked and likely infecting millions of people a day, according to some international health experts.

China officially reported one new COVID death for Wednesday, down from three on Tuesday, but foreign governments and many epidemiologists believe the numbers are much higher, and that more than 1 million people may die next year.

China has said it only counts deaths of COVID patients caused by pneumonia and respiratory failure as COVID-related.

In the southwestern city of Chengdu, funeral parlours were busy after dark on Wednesday, with a steady stream of cars entering one, which was heavily guarded by security personnel.

One van driver working for the parlour said the past few weeks have been particularly busy and that “huge numbers of people” were inside.

Hospitals and funeral homes in major cities have been under intense pressure, but the main concern over the health system’s ability to cope with surging infections is focused on the countryside.

At a Shanghai pharmacy, Wang Kaiyun, 53, a cleaner in the city who comes from the neighbouring Anhui province, said she was buying medicines for her family back home.

“My husband, my son, my grandson, my mother, they are all infected,” she said. “They can’t get any medicine, nothing for fever or cough.”

Each year, hundreds of millions of people, mostly working in factories near the southern and eastern coasts, return to the countryside for the Lunar New Year, due to start on Jan. 22.

The holiday travel rush is expected to last for 40 days, from Jan. 7 to Feb. 15, authorities said.

The state-run China Daily reported on Thursday that rural regions across China were beefing up their medical treatment capacities.

It said a hospital in a rural part of Inner Mongolia where more than 100,000 people live was seeking bidders for a 1.9 million yuan ($272,308) contract to upgrade its wards into intensive care units.

Liancheng County Central Hospital in the eastern Fujian province was seeking tenders for ambulances and medical devices, ranging from breathing machines to electrocardiogram monitors.

In December, tenders put out by hospitals for key medical equipment were two-to-three times higher than in previous months, according to a Reuters review，suggesting hospitals across the country were scrambling to plug shortages.

TESTING REQUIREMENTS

The world’s second-largest economy is expected to suffer a slowdown in factory output and domestic consumption in the near term as workers and shoppers fall ill.

The contact-intensive services sector, which accounts for roughly half of China’s economic output, was hammered by the country’s anti-virus curbs, which shut down many restaurants and restricted travel. As China re-opens, many businesses in the services industry have no money to expand.

The re-opening also raises the prospect of Chinese tourists returning to shopping streets around the world, once a market worth $255 billion a year globally. But some countries have been taken aback by the scale of the outbreak and are sceptical of Beijing’s COVID statistics.

China’s official death toll of 5,246 since the pandemic began compares with more than 1 million deaths in the United States. Chinese-ruled Hong Kong has reported more than 11,000 deaths.

The United States, India, Italy, Japan and Taiwan said they would require COVID tests for travellers from China. Britain was considering a similar move, the Telegraph reported.

The United States issued a travel alert on Wednesday advising Americans to “reconsider travel to China, Hong Kong, and Macau” and citing “reports that the healthcare system is overwhelmed” along with the risk of new variants.

The main airport in the Italian city of Milan started testing passengers arriving from Beijing and Shanghai on Dec. 26 and found that almost half of them were infected.

China has rejected criticism of its statistics as groundless and politically motivated attempts to smear its policies. It has also played down the risk of new variants, saying it expects mutations to be more virulent but less severe.

Omicron was still the dominant strain in China, Chinese health officials said this week.

Australia, Germany, Thailand and others said they would not impose additional restrictions on travel for now.

For its part, China, whose borders have been all but shut to foreigners since early 2020, will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8.

($1 = 6.9774 yuan)

Additional reporting by Martin Quin Pollard in Chengdu; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Lincoln Feast, Robert Birsel

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Hong Kong scraps most COVID rules, though masks still mandated

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HONG KONG, Dec 28 (Reuters) – Hong Kong will cancel its stringent COVID-19 rules from Thursday, city leader John Lee said, meaning that arrivals will no longer need to do mandatory PCR tests while the city’s vaccine pass would also be scrapped.

All measures would be cancelled on Thursday, apart from the wearing of masks which still remains compulsory, Lee told a media briefing on Wednesday.

“The city has reached a relatively high vaccination rate which builds an anti-epidemic barrier,” Lee said.

“Hong Kong has a sufficient amount of medicine to fight COVID, and healthcare workers have gained rich experience in facing the pandemic,” he added.

Lee said his government is aiming to reopen the borders with mainland China by Jan. 15 and was working with authorities over the border to ensure an orderly re-opening.

He said the authorities have been preparing for the scrapping of all restrictions.

“The time is appropriate for us to do this, having prepared for six months to do this,” said Lee. “The whole society is preparing for this. We are doing all this according to our local epidemic situation.”

Hong Kong’s vaccine pass requirement, which was imposed in February and was a must for people to access most venues in Hong Kong, will end from Thursday. Social distancing rules such as a cap on gatherings of more than 12 people in public will also be scrapped from Thursday.

The city has for nearly three years largely followed China’s lead in tackling the novel coronavirus, with both places being the last strongholds in adopting a zero-COVID policy.

The removal of the curbs are likely to result in an increase of travellers to the former British colony who have previously shunned it due to strict restrictions.

In an abrupt change of policy, China this month began dismantling the world’s strictest COVID regime of lockdowns and extensive testing. The country will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8, authorities said this week.

Restrictions on travel between Hong Kong and the mainland were imposed in early 2020. The reopening was postponed several times due to outbreaks in Hong Kong or the mainland.

International passengers arriving in Hong Kong since mid-month are no longer subject to COVID-related movement controls or barred from certain venues, the government announced in December.

Business groups, diplomats and many residents had slammed Hong Kong’s COVID-19 rules, saying they threatened its competitiveness and standing as an international financial centre.

The rules have weighed on Hong Kong’s economy since early 2020, speeding up an exodus of businesses, expatriates and local families that have left amid a drive by Beijing to more closely control the former British colony.

Additional reporting by Jessie Pang and Angel Woo; Editing by Tom Hogue, Lincoln Feast and Muralikumar Anantharaman

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Chinese hospitals, funeral homes ‘extremely busy’ as COVID spreads unchecked

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  • Hospitals, funeral parlours report surge in COVID infections
  • China reports three new COVID deaths for Tuesday
  • Some countries consider travel rules for Chinese visitors

CHENGDU, Dec 28 (Reuters) – Chinese hospitals and funeral homes were under intense pressure on Wednesday as a surging COVID-19 wave drained resources, while the scale of the outbreak and doubts over official data prompted some countries to consider new travel rules on Chinese visitors.

In an abrupt change of policy, China this month began dismantling the world’s strictest COVID regime of lockdowns and extensive testing, putting its battered economy on course for a complete re-opening next year.

The lifting of restrictions, which came after widespread protests against them, means COVID is spreading largely unchecked and likely infecting millions of people a day, according to some international health experts.

The speed at which China, the last major country in the world moving towards treating the virus as endemic, has scrapped COVID rules has left its fragile health system overwhelmed.

China reported three new COVID-related deaths for Tuesday, up from one for Monday – numbers that are inconsistent with what funeral parlours are reporting, as well as with the experience of much less populous countries after they re-opened.

Staff at Huaxi, a big hospital in the southwestern city of Chengdu, said they were “extremely busy” caring for COVID patients.

“I’ve been doing this job for 30 years and this is the busiest I have ever known it,” said one ambulance driver outside the hospital who declined to be identified.

There were long queues inside and outside the hospital’s emergency department and at an adjacent fever clinic on Tuesday evening. Most of those arriving in ambulances were given oxygen to help with their breathing.

“Almost all of the patients have COVID,” one emergency department pharmacy staff member said.

The hospital has no stocks of COVID-specific medicine and can only provide drugs for symptoms such as coughing, she said.

Car parks around the Dongjiao funeral home, one of the biggest in Chengdu, were full. Funeral processions were constant as smoke billowed from the crematorium.

“We have to do this about 200 times a day now,” said one funerals worker. “We are so busy we don’t even have time to eat. This has been the case since the opening up. Before it was around 30-50 a day.”

“Many have died from COVID,” said another worker.

At another Chengdu crematorium, privately-owned Nanling, staff were equally busy.

“There have been so many deaths from COVID lately,” one worker said. “Cremation slots are all fully booked. You can’t get one until the new year, maybe Jan. 3 at the earliest.”

China has said it only counts deaths of COVID patients caused by pneumonia and respiratory failure as COVID-related.

Zhang Yuhua, an official at the Beijing Chaoyang Hospital, said most recent patients were elderly and critically ill with underlying diseases. She said the number of patients receiving emergency care had increased to 450-550 per day, from about 100 before, according to state media.

The China-Japan Friendship Hospital’s fever clinic in Beijing was also “packed” with gray-haired patients, state media reported.

Nurses and doctors have been asked to work while sick and retired medical workers in rural communities were being rehired to help. Some cities have been struggling to secure supplies of anti-fever drugs.

TRAVEL RULES

In a major step towards freer travel, China will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8, authorities said this week, prompting many Chinese, cut off from the world for so long, to check travel platforms.

But while online searches for flights spiked on Tuesday from extremely low levels, residents and travel agencies suggested a return to anything like normal would take some months yet, as caution prevails for now.

Moreover, some governments were considering extra travel requirements for Chinese visitors.

U.S. officials cited “the lack of transparent data” as reasons for doing so.

India and Japan would require a negative COVID test for travellers from mainland China, with those testing positive in Japan having to undergo a week in quarantine. Tokyo also plans to limit airlines increasing flights to China.

The Philippines was also considering imposing tests”.

ECONOMIC PAIN

China’s $17 trillion economy is expected to suffer a slowdown in factory output and domestic consumption as workers and shoppers fall ill.

News of re-opening borders sent global luxury stocks higher, but the reaction was more muted in other corners of the market.

U.S. carmaker Tesla (TSLA.O) plans to run a reduced production schedule at its Shanghai plant in January, according to an internal schedule reviewed by Reuters. It did not specify a reason.

Once the initial shock of new infections passes, some economists expect Chinese growth to bounce back with a vengeance from what is this year expected to be its lowest rate in nearly half a century, somewhere around 3%.

Morgan Stanley economists expect 5.4% growth in 2023, while those at Goldman Sachs see 5.2%.

Reporting by Marting Quin Pollard in Chengdu, Chen Lin in Singapore and Shanghai and Beijing bureaus; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Lincoln Feast.

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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U.S. weighs new COVID rules for travelers from China

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Dec 27 (Reuters) – 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 the China. Malaysia put in place additional tracking and surveillance measures.

“There are mounting concerns in the international community on the ongoing COVID-19 surges in China and the lack of transparent data, including viral genomic sequence data, being reported from the PRC,” the officials said, using the initials of the People’s Republic of China.

Some hospitals and funeral homes in China have been overwhelmed as the virus spreads largely unchecked across the country of 1.4 billion people.

Official statistics, however, showed only one COVID death in the seven days to Monday, fuelling doubts among health experts and residents about the government’s data. The numbers are inconsistent with the experience of much less populous countries after they re-opened.

China said on Monday it would stop requiring inbound travelers to go into quarantine starting from Jan. 8 in a major step towards easing curbs on its borders, which have been largely shut since 2020.

Reporting by Steve Holland, writing by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Lincoln Feast.

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World

Chinese make travel plans as Beijing dismantles zero-COVID rules

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  • China to ease border restrictions from Jan. 8
  • Online searches for flights spike – travel platforms
  • COVID wave overwhelms hospitals, weighs on economy

BEIJING, Dec 27 (Reuters) – Chinese people, cut off from the rest of the world for three years by stringent COVID-19 curbs, flocked to travel sites on Tuesday ahead of borders reopening next month, even as rising infections strained the health system and roiled the economy.

Zero-COVID measures in place since early 2020 – from shuttered borders to frequent lockdowns – last month fuelled the Chinese mainland’s biggest show of public discontent since President Xi Jinping took power in 2012.

His subsequent abrupt U-turn on the curbs, which have battered the $17-trillion economy, the world’s second-largest, means the virus is now spreading largely unchecked across the country of 1.4 billion people.

Official statistics, however, showed only one COVID death in the seven days to Monday, fuelling doubts among health experts and residents about the government’s data. The numbers are inconsistent with the experience of much less populous countries after they re-opened.

Doctors say hospitals are overwhelmed with five-to-six-times more patients than usual, most of them elderly. International health experts estimate millions of daily infections and predict at least one million COVID deaths in China next year.

Nevertheless, Chinese authorities are determined to dismantle the last vestiges of their zero-COVID policies.

In a major step towards freer travel – cheered by global stock markets on Tuesday – China will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8, the National Health Commission (NHC) said late on Monday.

“It finally feels as if China has turned the corner,” AmCham China Chairman Colm Rafferty said of the imminent lifting of the quarantine rule.

There are no official restrictions on Chinese people going abroad but the new rule will make it much easier for them to return home.

Travel platform Ctrip’s data showed that within half an hour of the news, searches for popular cross-border destinations had increased 10-fold. Macau, Hong Kong, Japan, Thailand and South Korea were the most sought-after, Ctrip said.

Data from Trip.com showed outbound flights bookings were up 254% early on Tuesday from the day before.

China’s National Immigration Administration said on Tuesday that it would resume processing passport applications of Chinese nationals seeking to travel abroad and approving visits of mainland residents to Hong Kong.

China will also resume the implementation of a policy allowing visa-free transit of up to 144 hours for travellers. The extension or renewal of foreigners’ visas will also be restored, the immigration administration added.

Shares in global luxury goods groups, which rely heavily on Chinese shoppers, rose on Tuesday on the easing of travel restrictions. China accounts for 21% of the world’s 350-billion euro luxury goods market.

Ordinary Chinese and travel agencies, however, suggested that a return to anything like normal would take some months yet, given worries about COVID and more careful spending because of the impact of the pandemic.

Separately, once the border with Hong Kong reopens next month, mainland Chinese will be able to take BioNTech-made mRNA vaccines, seen as more effective than the domestically-developed options available on the mainland.

‘GREAT PRESSURE’

China’s classification of COVID will also be downgraded to the less strict Category B from the current top-level Category A from Jan. 8, the health authority said, meaning authorities will no longer be compelled to quarantine patients and close contacts and impose lockdowns.

But for all the excitement of a gradual return to a pre-COVID way of life, there was mounting pressure on the healthcare system, with doctors saying many hospitals are overwhelmed while funeral parlours report a surge in demand for their services.

Nurses and doctors have been asked to work while sick and retired medical workers in rural communities were being rehired to help, state media reported. Some cities have been struggling to secure supplies of anti-fever drugs.

“Some places are facing great pressure at hospital emergency wards and intensive care units,” NHC official Jiao Yahui told reporters.

While the Chinese economy is expected to see a sharp rebound later next year, it is in for a rough ride in the coming weeks and months as workers increasingly fall ill.

Many shops in Shanghai, Beijing and elsewhere have closed in recent days with staff unable to come to work, while some factories have already sent many of their workers on leave for the late January Lunar New Year holidays.

“The concern of a temporary supply chain distortion remains as the labour force is impacted by infections,” JPMorgan analysts said in a note, adding that their tracking of subway traffic in 29 cities showed that many people were restricting their movements as the virus spreads.

Data on Tuesday showed industrial profits fell 3.6% in January-November from a year earlier, versus a 3.0% drop for January-October, reflecting the toll of the anti-virus curbs in place last month, including in major manufacturing regions.

Authorities said they would step up financial support to small and private businesses in the hard-hit catering and tourism sectors.

The lifting of travel restrictions is positive for the economy, but strong caveats apply.

Japan Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said his country would require a negative COVID test for travellers from mainland China. The government would also limit airlines increasing flights to China, he said.

“International travel … will likely surge, yet it may take many more months before volumes return to the pre-pandemic level,” said Dan Wang, chief economist at Hang Seng Bank China.

“COVID is still spreading in most parts of China, greatly disrupting the normal work schedule. Loss in productivity is significant.”

Reporting by Beijing and Shanghai bureaus and Chen Lin in Singapore; Writing by Marius Zaharia and Sumeet Chatterjee; Editing by Lincoln Feast, Robert Birsel and Frank Jack Daniel

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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World

Beijing, Shanghai residents back to work as China limps towards living with COVID

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  • Life limping back to normal in Shanghai, Beijing
  • Cities across China report large numbers of infections
  • China reports no COVID deaths for 6th consecutive day

BEIJING/SHANGHAI, Dec 26 (Reuters) – Mask-wearing Beijing and Shanghai commuters crowded subway trains on Monday as China’s two biggest cities edged closer to living with COVID-19 even as frontline medical workers scrambled to cope with millions of new infections.

After three years of harsh anti-coronavirus curbs, President Xi Jinping scrapped the country’s zero-COVID policy of lockdowns and relentless testing this month in the face of protests and a widening outbreak.

The virus is now spreading largely unchecked across the country, with doubts mounting among health experts and residents over China’s statistics, which show no new COVID deaths reported for the six days through Sunday.

Doctors say hospitals are overwhelmed with five-to-six-times more patients than usual, mostly elderly.

But after the initial shock of the policy U-turn, and a few weeks in which people in Beijing and Shanghai stayed indoors, either dealing with the disease or trying to avoid it, there are signs that life, at least for those able to cope with the disease, is on track to returning closer to normal.

Subway trains in Beijing and Shanghai were packed, while some major traffic arteries in the two cities were jammed with slow-moving cars on Monday as residents commuted to work.

“I am prepared to live with the pandemic,” said 25-year-old Shanghai resident Lin Zixin. “Lockdowns are not a long-term solution

This year, in an effort to prevent infections from spiralling out of control across the country, the 25 million people in China’s commercial hub endured two months of bitter isolation under a strict lockdown that lasted until June 1.

Shanghai’s lively streets were a sharp contrast with the atmosphere in April and May, when hardly anyone went outside.

An annual Christmas market held at the Bund, a commercial area in Shanghai, was popular with city residents over the weekend. Crowds thronged the winter festive season at Shanghai Disneyland and Beijing’s Universal Studios on Sunday, queuing up for rides in Christmas-themed outfits.

The number of trips to scenic spots in the southern city of Guangzhou this weekend increased by 132% from last weekend, local newspaper The 21st Century Business Herald reported.

“Now basically everyone has returned to a normal routine,” said a 29-year-old Beijing resident surnamed Han.

China is the last major country to move toward treating COVID as endemic. Its containment measures had slowed the $17 trillion economy to its lowest growth rate in nearly half a century, disrupting global supply chains and trade.

[1/5] Commuters ride a subway train during the morning rush hour amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Shanghai, China December 26, 2022. REUTERS/Xihao Jiang

The world’s second-largest economy is expected to suffer further in the short-term, as the COVID wave spreads toward manufacturing areas and workforces fall ill, before bouncing back next year, analysts say.

Tesla suspended production at its Shanghai plant on Saturday, bringing ahead a plan to pause most work at the plant in the last week of December. The company did not give a reason.

‘OVERWHELMED’

The world’s most populous country has narrowed its definition for classifying deaths as COVID-related, counting only those involving COVID-caused pneumonia or respiratory failure, raising eyebrows among world health experts.

The country’s healthcare system has been under enormous strain, with staff being asked to work while sick and retired medical workers in rural communities being rehired to help, according to state media.

“The hospital is just overwhelmed from top to bottom,” doctor Howard Bernstein at the privately owned Beijing United Family Hospital said.

The provincial government of Zhejiang, a big industrial province near Shanghai with a population of 65.4 million, said on Sunday it was battling about a million new daily COVID-19 infections, a number expected to double in the days ahead.

Health authorities in the southeastern Jiangxi province have said infections would hit an apex in early January, adding that there could be other peaks as people travel next month for Lunar New Year celebrations, state media reported.

They warned that the wave of infections would last three months and that about 80% of the province’s 45 million residents could get infected.

The city of Qingdao, in the eastern Shandong province, has estimated that up to 530,000 residents were being infected each day.

Cities across China have been racing to add intensive-care units and fever clinics, facilities designed to prevent the wider spread of contagious disease in hospitals.

The Beijing municipal government has said the number of fever clinics in the city had increased from 94 to almost 1,300, state media said. Shanghai has 2,600 such clinics and has transferred doctors from less-strained medical departments to help out.

Worries remain about the ability of less-affluent cities in China to cope with a surge in severe infections, especially as hundreds of millions of rural migrant workers are expected to return to their families for Lunar New Year.

“I am worried the flow of people will be huge … (and) the epidemic will break out again,” said Lin, the Shanghai resident.

Reporting by the Beijing and Shanghai bureaus; Writing by Marius Zaharia; Editing by Gerry Doyle and Muralikumar Anantharaman

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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