In addition to mandatory testing, it is now recommended, among other things, that travelers from China be randomly tested for Corona when they arrive in the EU. Positive samples should be sequenced if necessary. In addition, waste water from airports where machines from China arrive must be examined.
Just a month after the end of the Covid-0 zero strategy, followed for almost three years, several hundred million people in China have already been infected with the virus. As of January 8, the quarantine obligation will also end when entering China. According to experts, the great outbreak should last until March or April. Exact infection figures are not available because authorities have stopped publishing epidemiological data. The World Health Organization again requested more information from China on Wednesday. At the same time, she showed understanding for countries that have introduced testing regulations for travelers from the most populous country.
Several EU countries, such as Italy, France and Spain, have already tightened entry rules on their own in recent days. It brought back memories of the beginning of the pandemic, when rules in Europe varied from country to country and were difficult for travelers to follow. The deal on Wednesday is now aimed at securing a unified EU response.
The EU health authority, ECDC, had recently given the all-clear about the situation in China. This is unlikely to have any impact on the epidemiological situation in Europe, the official said on Tuesday. She also emphasized that variants in the People’s Republic of the EU are already in circulation and therefore do not pose a challenge to the immune response of EU citizens. The fact that EU states have now agreed to new measures is also due to data from China being deemed insufficient.
Beijing recently emphasized that it had shared transparent information about the recent spread of the virus. WHO emergency aid coordinator Mike Ryan emphasized on Wednesday that the testing requirement was not a travel restriction.