China has eased some of its tough Covid rules to ease economic pressures and escalating discontent, though authorities insist their “war” on the pandemic remains unchanged.
Changes include cutting quarantine periods by two days for close contacts of infected people and travelers arriving in the country, and scrapping a rule penalizing airlines if they bring in too many cases.
The move came a day after President Xi Jinping and the country’s top decision-makers at the Communist Party’s Politburo Standing Committee heard a working report on Covid measures. The National Health Commission’s announcement stressed that the country “will not deviate from the dynamic zero-Covid policy” and changes were made only to “bolster” measures to combat the pandemic.
“The situation remains serious and complicated. We must maintain strategic focus and … take more determined and decisive action to contain the spread of the pandemic and focus on war of annihilation in key areas,” the commission said.
Speaking at a regular news conference, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters, “This certainly doesn’t mean we can slack off in our response or even end the Covid restrictions and ‘lay flat’ (give up). China has upgraded and adjusted its containment measures in response to the way the virus is mutating.”
The news was greeted cautiously by many Chinese, who are increasingly unhappy with nearly three years of Covid curbs hurting the world’s second largest economy.
“The excessive measures are what we common people hate the most. I hope the officials will really play by the rules,” said a user on social media platform Weibo.
As part of the new measures, the centralized quarantine periods for close contacts and travelers from abroad have been reduced from seven to five days. The requirement of three more days of home isolation after centralized quarantine remains in place.
China will also stop trying to identify “secondary” contacts – a major nuisance for residents of cities engaged in full-scale contact tracing efforts if a case is found – and will continue to identify close contacts.
The commission said it will also develop a plan to accelerate vaccinations, which experts say is crucial before the country can begin to more fully roll back a zero-Covid policy that has made China a global outlier.
A disease control worker wears protective clothing as people queue at a Covid testing stand in Beijing. Photo: Kevin Frayer/Getty ImagesThe new measures include an adjustment to the categorization of Covid risk areas into ‘high’ and ‘low’ – removing a ‘medium’ category to minimize the number of people affected by control measures.
The new steps include ending a “circuit breaker” that saw airlines face suspending flights if they were flying in too many Covid-infected passengers, a system that often led to cancellations. Yet international flights remain at a small fraction of pre-Covid levels.
The easing comes even as case numbers in China have risen to their highest level since April, with record numbers in Beijing and downtown Zhengzhou. Numerous cities have expanded local lockdowns and other measures, including in the southern metropolis of Guangzhou.
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The country reported 10,729 new cases, and more than 5 million people were confined to their homes in the southern manufacturing hub of Guangzhou and the western megacity of Chongqing.
Beijing, where most of its 21 million people are tested almost daily, has closed parks and imposed other restrictions. Many city schools switched to online instruction, hospitals restricted services and some shops and restaurants have closed and their employees have been quarantined. Videos on social media showed people in some areas protesting or fighting with police and health workers.
Chen Daoyin, a former associate professor at Shanghai University of Political Science and Law, said people shouldn’t get too optimistic because the “fundamental tone” of the Chinese government hasn’t changed.
“From the way they emphasize that you can’t relax and ‘lay flat,’ we can tell that this is a micro-adjustment, not a fundamental change. The government does not believe the conditions are in place for full-scale easing.”
“From a pessimistic point of view, I cannot see the government changing its basic policies as long as the virus keeps mutating,” he said.
Additional coverage from Portal and Associated Press