Flights from Tokyo to Beijing could not be found this week – the closest available flight was to Kunming in the southern province of Yunnan, some 1,600 miles (2,600 kilometers) away. There I will spend 21 days in quarantine, and even then there is no guarantee that I will be allowed into the Chinese capital.
Since mid-December, China’s average daily case count has risen from double-digits to over 20,000. At least 27 cities across the country are in full or partial lockdown, affecting around 180 million people, according to CNN calculations.
Some of the strictest measures apply in the country’s financial hub, Shanghai, where many of its 25 million residents have been locked in their neighborhoods for more than a month, prompting discontent that has swept China’s heavily monitored internet.
Government censors have struggled to keep up with a torrent of anger over food shortages, lack of access to medical care and – for those who have tested positive – poor conditions in makeshift quarantine camps. Protests have even erupted – a rare sight in authoritarian China – and local residents have clashed with the police.
The number of cases in Beijing remains low compared to Shanghai — 34 new cases were reported in the capital on Friday, bringing the total number of cases during this outbreak to 228.
But China is taking no chances in trying to stop the spread of the virus in its political center.
Travel to China
My trip to China this week was even more difficult than my trip to Beijing in February for the Winter Olympics, held amid the world’s toughest Covid countermeasures. Then officials, media and athletes were separated from the Chinese public by an extensive network of physical barriers, quarantine periods and regular Covid tests.
Now, to enter China, I had to present three negative PCR tests from government-approved clinics, taken seven days before departure, then two more within 48 hours of flight.
On the plane, all flight attendants wore hazmat suits, as did staff at Kunming Airport. Upon landing, all passengers on my flight were immediately instructed to have another Covid test, a mouth-watering nose and throat swab.
Most of the passengers on my flight seemed to have Chinese passports.
Foreigners can only enter under very limited circumstances, and American journalists are finding it extremely difficult to obtain a China visa due to deteriorating US-China relations. Both countries agreed to ease visa restrictions on each other’s journalists after a meeting between US President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping last November. After several rounds of talks, I was granted a visa earlier this year.
But when I handed over my American passport, the immigration officer flipped through the pages for a few minutes and then summoned a group of workers with “police” written on their hazmat suits. It seemed like I was the only one pulled aside from the flight.
They took me to a private room for interrogation, and after a lengthy police interrogation about my professional and personal life, I was allowed onward through immigration and customs.
After passing through passport control, I struck up a conversation with the man standing next to me while we waited to board the bus to the quarantine hotel. He is from Shanghai but has lived in Japan for 30 years. He hadn’t returned to China since the pandemic began, but eventually decided the 21-day quarantine was worth entering the country to visit his elderly mother in Shanghai. The city is now under a weeks-long Covid lockdown, so his only option was to fly to Yunnan and wait for the situation to improve.
China’s National Health Commission on Friday said the “zero Covid-19 policy” has started showing results in Shanghai, and the situation across the country is showing a downward trend.
21 days in hotel quarantine
There was not a single seat on the bus and our luggage was piling up in the aisles. From the bus window, I watched Kunming, a city of 6.6 million people, roll by at night – bright lights illuminating the buildings and highways.
After a two to three hour drive, we reached our quarantine location: a thermal hotel converted into a quarantine facility. Workers in hazmat suits escorted me to my room.
The next morning I realized that my room offers a breathtaking view of Kunming – an expanse of green trees and mountains dotting the horizon. Kunming is the capital of Yunnan Province, a popular tourist destination famous for its beautiful scenery and tea-growing areas.
There is a balcony but I can’t go out. But I’m grateful for the view and especially for the opportunity to open the window for fresh air – in some quarantine facilities that are prohibited.
I can’t open my door except for health checks and meal pickup. I get two temperature checks a day and regular Covid tests, sometimes twice a day.
Grocery deliveries aren’t allowed, but breakfast, lunch and dinner are included in the quarantine fees, which vary depending on the hotel you’re taken to – you have no choice where to go.
Meals come in plastic containers placed on a chair out front three times a day – usually rice, soup and fried meat and vegetables. I complement the meals with snacks I brought from Tokyo after hearing about the subpar food in the quarantine hotels. Luckily the food doesn’t bother me.
There is no refrigerator, no microwave and no laundry service in my room. Only one towel will be distributed for the entire 21 days. I packed my own yoga mat, skipping rope and weights for the exercises. Despite the hot weather – it’s around 30 degrees Celsius – the hotel will not turn on the air conditioning due to concerns about Covid transmission.
Assuming I continue to test negative, I might still not make it to Beijing. If the capital goes into full lockdown, all flights are likely to be cancelled.
Even before this latest outbreak, arrivals from parts of China deemed “high risk” had to spend an additional 14 days in government quarantine in Beijing. Fortunately, Yunnan is not one of them at the moment. Inbound domestic travelers from lower-risk destinations must remain sealed in their homes for at least seven days for health surveillance.
China’s authorities have doubled down on the zero-Covid policy, arguing it has allowed the country to avoid the explosion in deaths elsewhere in the world and will buy time to vaccinate vulnerable groups like the elderly and children.
“If we lose the Covid control measures, a large number of people will be infected with many critical patients and deaths, leading to the medical system being overwhelmed,” Vice Director of the National Health Commission Li Bin said on Friday.
But critics say politics is more about politics than science.
President Xi put his personal stamp on “zero-Covid,” and officials have frequently used the low death rate to argue that China’s system is superior to the West, where restrictions have been eased to reflect rising vaccination rates.
But in China there is no sign of change and people are getting tired.
In the third year of the pandemic, China still refuses to live with Covid. No case will be tolerated, no matter what the cost.