The United States followed suit Countries that systematically test travelers from China, but a European Union (EU) agency deemed the measure “unjustified” despite the Covid19 wave hitting the Asian country. The new outbreak erupted after China on December 7, without prior notice, ended its draconian “Covid Zero” policy, which had been in effect since the first wave of the disease, first identified in Wuhan three years ago.
These measures made it possible to protect the population from the new coronavirus, with widespread detection tests and surveillance of movements, as well as strict lockdowns and quarantines imposed when infections were detected. However, these policies hit the economy and exhausted the populace, which staged protests against the communist government in November that were unprecedented in three decades. The official change of position was abrupt and triggered the infections.
China’s National Health Commission has stopped releasing the daily number of cases, but officials in several cities estimate hundreds of thousands of people have contracted the disease in recent weeks as hospitals and crematoria across the country are overwhelmed. Authorities have also changed the criteria for defining deaths from the coronavirus by only including deaths caused by respiratory failure in the list.
fears
The new wave has raised fears of another global health crisis amid interest by many Chinese in traveling abroad after restrictions are lifted. Japan, India, Malaysia, Taiwan, Italy and the United States announced restrictive measures with the obligation to present or carry out current Covid tests at airports.
“The recent rapid increase in transmission of Covid19 in China raises the possibility of new variants emerging,” a US Department of Health and Human Services source said. However, the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) considered the imposition of these measures “unjustified” this Thursday (29).
“In order to be able to carry out a risk assessment of the Covid19 situation in China, the World Health Organization (WHO) needs more detailed information,” admitted the director of the UN agency, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. “Given the lack of information from China, it is understandable that countries around the world are taking actions that they believe can help protect their populations,” he added.
In Brussels, an informal meeting convened by the European Commission aimed at “coordinated action” by member states did not lead to a decision. For its part, Beijing has criticized “the exaggeration, slander and political manipulation” of the Western press.
Chinese at Beijing International Airport were generally sympathetic to the measures, but a man, who gave only his last name, Hu, 22, said the rules were unnecessary and “a little discriminatory”.
overcrowded hospitals
Chinese hospitals are struggling with the rise in infections, which are particularly affecting the elderly and vulnerable. AFP journalists watched as patients wearing masks were pulled from ambulances at a hospital in Shanghai on Thursday.
In Tianjin, 140 km southwest of Beijing, AFP visited two emergency rooms of hospitals full of patients with the virus. A doctor explained that health workers were called to work even if they were infected.
AFP observed more than 20 patients, most of them elderly, lying on stretchers in open emergency rooms and a body in a bedroom.
(AFP)