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Tag: China Covid policy

  • Face masks ought to be beneficial to passengers: WHO as new Covid variant spreads

    Passengers on long-haul flights ought to put on face masks, the World Health Organisation (WHO) mentioned amid the fast unfold of the newest Omicron subvariant within the United States.

    New Delhi,UPDATED: Jan 12, 2023 12:18 IST

    Visitors sporting protecting face masks stroll underneath decorations for the New Year (Photo: Reuters)

    By India Today Web Desk: Officials of the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Tuesday mentioned nations ought to contemplate recommending that passengers put on masks on long-haul flights. The assertion comes amid the fast unfold of the newest Omicron subvariant of Covid-19 within the United States.

    Addressing a press convention, the WHO and European officers mentioned the sporting of face masks ought to be a suggestion issued to passengers arriving from anyplace the place there’s widespread Covid-19 transmission.

    WHO’s senior emergency officer for Europe, Catherine Smallwood mentioned, “Countries need to look at the evidence base for pre-departure testing” and if motion is taken into account, journey measures ought to be carried out in a non-discriminatory method.”

    That did not mean the agency recommended testing for passengers from the United States at this stage, she added.

    Last week, the EU’s Integrated Political Crisis Response group (IPCR), a body made up of officials from the EU’s 27 governments, also recommended all passengers on flights to and from China should wear face masks and random testing of passengers arriving from China.

    ALSO READ | WHO reiterates need for China to share more Covid data

    Many scientists – including from the WHO – believe China is likely under-reporting the true extent of its outbreak.

    The WHO is aware that the case-definition of what counts as a Covid-19 death in China is narrow and “not essentially the case definition that WHO has beneficial nations undertake,” said Smallwood.

    More than a dozen countries – including the United States – are demanding Covid tests from travellers from China.

    XBB.1.5 – THE MOST TRANSMISSIBLE OMICRON SUBVARIANT

    XBB.1.5 – the most transmissible Omicron subvariant detected so far – accounted for 27.6 per cent of Covid-19 cases in the United States for the week ended January 7, health officials have said.

    It was unclear if XBB.1.5 would cause its own wave of global infections.

    The variant is another descendant of Omicron, the most contagious and now globally dominant variant of the virus that causes Covid-19.

    It is an offshoot of XBB, first detected in October, itself a recombinant of two other Omicron subvariants.

    Concerns about XBB.1.5 fuelling a fresh spate of cases in the United States and beyond are rising amid a surge of Covid cases in China after the country pivoted away from its signature “zero COVID” policy last month.

    ALSO READ | US extends public health emergency status for Covid

    WHAT DATA ON OMICRON VARIANTS SHOW

    According to data reported by the WHO earlier this month, an analysis by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention showed a predominance of Omicron sublineages BA.5.2 and BF.7 among locally acquired infections.

    The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) on Tuesday issued recommendations for flights between China and the European Union including “non-pharmaceutical measures to cut back the unfold of the virus, resembling mask-wearing and testing of travellers, in addition to monitoring of waste water as an early warning software to detect new variants.”

    The agencies recommend “random testing may additionally be carried out on a pattern of arriving passengers” and “enhanced cleansing and disinfection of plane serving these routes.”

    ALSO READ | Most unsocially distanced in UK: Boris Johnson joked about Downing Street occasion amid Covid

    Published On:

    Jan 12, 2023

  • Chinese President Xi Jinping creates historical past, wins file third time period in energy

    Chinese President Xi Jinping on Sunday created historical past, changing into the primary chief of the ruling Communist Party after celebration founder Mao Zedong to get re-elected for an unprecedented third time period in energy with the prospect of ruling China for all times.

    Xi, 69, who was elected Sunday morning as General Secretary of the Communist Party for third five-year tenure by the brand new seven-member Standing Committee packed together with his supporters appeared earlier than the native and overseas media right here to herald the brand new period, broadly termed ‘Xi era’.

    New members of the Politburo Standing Committee, entrance to again, President Xi Jinping, Li Qiang, Zhao Leji, Wang Huning, Cai Qi, Ding Xuexiang, and Li Xi arrive on the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, Sunday, Oct. 23, 2022. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

    Xi’s “election” for the third time period in energy formally ends the over three a long time rule adopted by his predecessors, barring Mao, of retiring after a 10-year tenure. Xi was first elected in 2012 and shall be finishing his 10-year tenure this yr.

    With moderates like Premier Li Keqiang, who was ranked quantity two, eased out within the election to over 300-member Central Committee on Saturday by the once-in-a-five-year Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the Committee which met on Sunday elected a 25-member Political Bureau.

    The Political Bureau elected a seven-member Standing Committee, which in flip elected Xi for a 3rd five-year time period as General Secretary.

    Much on the anticipated traces, Xi was elected to the Central Committee on Saturday, to the Political Bureau and the Standing Committee after which as General Secretary on Sunday with relative ease because the Congress handed the important thing modification to the Party’s structure reinforcing his “core” standing with the directive that each one celebration members have the “obligation” to observe his directives and doctrines.

    Observers say Xi’s emergence as essentially the most highly effective chief as President, celebration chief and head of the navy with prospect of chief for all times within the footsteps of Mao, whose extremist ideological campaigns just like the Cultural Revolution ensuing extermination of tens of millions, is broadly anticipated to be seen with sense of unease and concern because the one-party state has now turn out to be one-leader state.

    New Politburo Standing Committee members Xi Jinping, Li Qiang, Zhao Leji, Wang Huning, Cai Qi, Ding Xuexiang and Li Xi meet the media following the twentieth National Congress of the Communist Party of China, on the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China October 23, 2022. (REUTERS)

    The well-choreographed week-long twentieth Congress ended on a sordid word on Saturday with former President Hu Jintao being bodily escorted out below the glare of the media on the ornate Great Hall of individuals.

    The incident is seen as an irony as 79-year-old Hu had peacefully handed over energy to Xi ten years in the past in 2012. However, official media reviews stated he was unwell.

    Meanwhile, a unique central administration headed by the brand new premier will formally happen in March.
    The celebration Congress additionally authorised an modification of the celebration Constitution on Saturday that might additional improve Xi’s stature as China’s chief.

    Xi, in his temporary closing remarks on Saturday, stated the revision of the Constitution units out clear necessities for upholding and strengthening the celebration’s general management.

    “Dare to struggle, dare to win, bury your heads and work hard. Be determined to keep forging ahead,” he stated on the concluding session of the Congress.

    “We must be ready to withstand high winds, choppy waters and even dangerous storms. Confronted with drastic changes in the international landscape, especially external attempts to blackmail, contain, (and) blockade… China, we have put our national interests first,” Xi stated, in an obvious reference to the rising negativity in opposition to China within the US and West.

    The CPC Congress has realised its objectives of unifying pondering, fortifying confidence, charting the course, and boosting morale, Xi advised the two,338 delegates current on the occasion, the state-run Xinhua information company reported.

    The Congress additionally appointed a brand new group of anti-corruption wing of the celebration known as the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), which straight features below Xi.

    According to official reviews, CCDI punished about 5 million officers, together with many prime military generals, within the final 10 years.

    Critics say Xi’s shock and awe marketing campaign helped him to consolidate his maintain on energy.

    Resolutions handed on the Congress eulogised Xi and his concepts, merging Marxism with Socialism with Chinese traits.

    A decision on an modification to the Constitution of the CPC adopted on the Congress stated all celebration members ought to observe Xi’s management.

    The Congress calls on celebration organisations in any respect ranges and all celebration members to observe the agency management of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi on the core, holding excessive the good banner of socialism with Chinese traits, it stated.

    “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era is the Marxism of contemporary China and of the 21st Century and embodies the best Chinese culture and ethos of this era,” the decision stated.

    Another prolonged decision on the work of the earlier Congress stresses that Marxism is the elemental guiding ideology upon which the CPC and the nation are based and thrive.

    It additionally laid out tips for the Chinese navy.

    The Congress stresses that attaining the objectives for the centenary of the People’s Liberation Army in 2027 and extra shortly elevating the folks’s armed forces to world-class requirements are strategic duties for constructing a contemporary socialist nation in all respects, the decision stated.

    The Congress calls on the entire celebration, your complete navy, and the Chinese folks of all ethnic teams to remain intently rallied across the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi “at its core, to keep in mind that empty talk will do nothing for our country and only solid work will make it flourish,” it stated.

    Praising efforts to manage the Covid-19, the decision additionally affirmed agency opposition to Taiwan’s independence. China claims Taiwan as a part of its mainland.

    Ahead of the twentieth Congress, Beijing witnessed uncommon public protests with banners held on overpasses of main thoroughfares, protesting in opposition to Xi’s unpopular zero-Covid coverage and authoritarian rule.

    Battery-operated loudspeakers have been additionally hung in some locations blaring anti-Xi and anti-Zero Covid slogans. Police shortly moved to take away the banners and loudspeakers. Similar reviews of protests had additionally come from completely different cities of China.

  • Shanghai strikes towards ending 2-month Covid-19 lockdown

    Shanghai authorities say they are going to take some main steps Wednesday towards reopening China’s largest metropolis after a two-month Covid-19 lockdown that has throttled the nationwide financial system and largely bottled up hundreds of thousands of individuals of their properties.

    Full bus and subway service will likely be restored as will primary rail connections with the remainder of China, Vice Mayor Zong Ming mentioned Tuesday at a each day information convention on town’s outbreak.

    Schools will partially reopen on a voluntary foundation for college kids and procuring malls, supermarkets, comfort shops and drug shops will proceed to reopen step by step with not more than 75% of their complete capability. Cinemas and gymnasiums will stay closed.

    Officials, who set June 1 because the goal date for reopening earlier in May, seem able to speed up what has been a gradual easing in latest days. A number of malls and markets have reopened, and a few residents have been given passes permitting them out for a number of hours at a time. In at the very least some discussion groups, cynicism concerning the gradual tempo and stop-and-go nature of opening up gave manner Tuesday to pleasure concerning the prospect of with the ability to transfer about freely within the metropolis for the primary time because the finish of March.

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    Shanghai recorded 29 new instances on Monday, persevering with a gradual decline from greater than 20,000 a day in April. Li Qiang, the highest official from China’s ruling Communist Party in Shanghai, at a gathering Monday was quoted as saying that town had made main achievements in combating the outbreak via steady battle.

    The success got here at a worth. Authorities imposed a suffocating citywide lockdown underneath China’s “zero-Covid” technique that goals to snuff out any outbreak with mass testing and isolation at centralized amenities of anybody who’s contaminated.

    Schools will reopen for the ultimate two years of highschool and the third yr of center college, however college students can determine whether or not to attend in particular person. Other grades and kindergarten stay closed.

    Beijing, the nation’s capital, additional eased restrictions Tuesday in some districts. The metropolis imposed restricted lockdowns, however nothing close to a citywide stage, in a a lot smaller outbreak that seems to be on the wane. Beijing recorded 18 new instances on Monday.

  • A side-effect of China’s strict virus coverage: Abandoned fruit

    At Pham Thanh Hong’s dragon fruit orchard in Vietnam, a lot of the lights are turned off. All is silent apart from the periodic thud of the ripe pink fruit falling to the bottom.
    Pham, 46, isn’t bothering to reap them.
    The farmer watched dragon fruit costs plummet by 25% within the final week of December to almost zero, pushed down by what a number of officers in Vietnam say is China’s “zero-COVID” coverage.
    “I’m too disheartened to use my strength to pick them up, then throw them away,” Pham stated.
    Selling fruit to China within the coronavirus pandemic isn’t for the fainthearted.
    China has gone to nice lengths to maintain the virus out of its borders. It has screened mail and examined hundreds of packages of fruit and frozen meals regardless of little proof that the virus will be transmitted by such merchandise. It has locked down complete cities, leaving Chinese residents stranded with out medication or meals.
    That strict virus coverage has additionally had alarming penalties effectively past China. Southeast Asian fruit farmers are particularly weak as a result of a lot of the area’s exports are directed towards the nation. In 2020, the full fruit exports from Southeast Asia to China stood at roughly $6 billion.
    “If they buy, we’re alive. If they don’t, we’re dead,” Pham stated. “We are growing dragon fruit, but it pretty much feels like gambling.”
    Long strains of vehicles arriving from Vietnam, Myanmar and Laos are actually backed up on China’s border crossings. Dragon fruit farmers in Vietnam, who export largely to China, have been pushed closely into debt.
    In Myanmar, watermelon exporters are dumping their fruit on the border as a result of truck drivers have been advised to quarantine for 15 days earlier than they’ll convey the products into China.
    The restrictions seem to have particularly damage Vietnam’s dragon fruit farmers. After 9 cities in China stated that they had detected the coronavirus on dragon fruit imported from Vietnam, authorities shut down supermarkets promoting the fruit, compelled not less than 1,000 individuals who had come into contact with the fruit to quarantine and ordered prospects to be examined.
    Then, in late December, China closed its border with Vietnam for the primary time throughout the pandemic.
    “China did not tell Vietnam anything in advance,” stated Dang Phuc Nguyen, normal secretary of the Vietnam Fruit and Vegetable Association. “They acted very suddenly.”
    More than 1 million Vietnamese dragon fruit, mango and jackfruit farmers have been affected by the curbs, in keeping with Dang. China accounts for greater than 55% of Vietnam’s $3.2 billion in fruit and vegetable exports, chief of which is the dragon fruit.
    Pham Thi Tu Lam, a farmer from Vietnam’s Vinh Long province, stated she determined to modify from rising oranges to dragon fruit in 2015. At that point, she may fetch $1.22 for 1 kilogram, or a bit of over 2 kilos, of the fruit. Now, as a result of costs have plunged to one-tenth of that, she has needed to abandon 1,150 of the concrete posts the place the vegetation are usually grown.
    Unable to seek out any patrons, she gave most of final 12 months’s harvest to her neighbors, used it for hen feed or tossed it. She had invested greater than $1,300 and three months into rising the dragon fruit. “All of which is now gone, with nothing left,” she stated.
    The ripple results of China’s zero-COVID-19 coverage have accelerated discussions about Southeast Asia’s dependence on the world’s second-largest economic system. They have additionally coincided with rising anxiousness within the area over Beijing’s presence within the South China Sea, disputed waters that many Southeast Asian nations declare as their very own.
    “Until COVID, it seemed to me that the economic influence of China was so great in Southeast Asia that all those countries, notwithstanding the political tensions, were gravitating more toward the Chinese orbit,” stated Bill Pritchard, a professor on the University of Sydney who has studied Southeast Asia’s fruit commerce with China. “I think this has been some sort of a road bump on that. Whether it’s permanent or whether it’s temporary, I don’t know.”
    For greater than a decade, fruit farmers in Southeast Asia have capitalized on a rising Chinese center class that has develop into more and more health-conscious. They additionally benefited from a sturdy street and freeway community linking their nations to China.
    Many of them had excessive hopes for the Lunar New Year, throughout which plates of lower tropical fruit are widespread options at dinner tables throughout China throughout the weeklong vacation.
    Chinese authorities reopened the border with Vietnam final month, however they haven’t relaxed their screening measures. In late January, roughly 2,000 autos have been caught on the border, down from 5,000 in mid-December, in keeping with Dang. Vietnamese officers have advised companies to keep away from the crossing for now.
    Nguyen Anh Duong, a director specializing in economics at Vietnam’s Central Institute for Economic Management, stated the Vietnamese authorities is making an attempt to assist farmers discover different markets, together with diverting dragon fruit to native supermarkets in Vietnam.
    But diversifying from China shall be troublesome. Using planes and ships to ship fruit to different nations would drive prices larger. Several of the fruit-growing areas in Southeast Asia will not be near airports.
    For now, fruit farmers are bracing for better hardship.
    Aye Myo Kyi, a watermelon farmer in Myanmar, stated he needed to throw his watermelons away when China clamped down on the border with Myanmar in April 2021.
    “I have never lost money like this before,” stated Aye Myo Kyi, who has been promoting watermelons since 2010. He stated he has now switched to promoting beans domestically.
    Thai exporters who normally ship their fruit by Vietnam and Laos, which share crossings with China, have been annoyed with authorities leaders for not serving to them handle their losses.
    Worakanya Panyaprasertkit, a longan exporter in Thailand, stated a cargo of her fruit was caught on the border with Vietnam for 60 days. By the time China introduced it could open its border crossing with the nation in January, a lot of the fruit had already gone dangerous.
    “We have complained to different agencies — they know about our problems — but even then we haven’t seen any progress,” she stated. “They are leaving us to fight for our own lives.”
    The exporters don’t count on the scenario to ease till after the Winter Olympics finish in Beijing on Feb. 20. China can be making an attempt to stamp out a number of outbreaks of the omicron variant at residence, which may result in much more stringent border screenings.
    Patchaya Khiaophan, vp of selling for the Thai Durian Association, stated she expects China to proceed to periodically open and shut its borders within the coming months. Thailand is growing disinfectants to spray on containers of durian for export and tightened the security and packaging requirements for the spiky fruit in time for the harvest in April.
    “We have to reassure the Chinese side that Thai durian is free from COVID,” stated Khiaophan. “We have prepared our farmers and businesspeople,” she stated. “For me, I don’t have high hopes.”

  • The military of thousands and thousands who implement China’s zero-Covid coverage, in any respect prices

    China’s “zero COVID” coverage has a devoted following: the thousands and thousands of people that work diligently towards that aim, irrespective of the human prices.
    In the northwestern metropolis of Xi’an, hospital staff refused to confess a person affected by chest pains as a result of he lived in a medium-risk district. He died of a coronary heart assault.
    They knowledgeable a lady who was eight months pregnant and bleeding that her COVID take a look at wasn’t legitimate. She misplaced her child.
    Two neighborhood safety guards informed a younger man they didn’t care that he had nothing to eat after catching him out through the lockdown. They beat him up.
    The Xi’an authorities was fast and resolute in imposing a strict lockdown in late December when instances had been on the rise. But it was not ready to offer meals, medical care and different requirements to the town’s 13 million residents, creating chaos and crises not seen for the reason that nation first locked down Wuhan in January 2020.
    China’s early success in containing the pandemic by way of iron-fist, authoritarian insurance policies emboldened its officers, seemingly giving them license to behave with conviction and righteousness. Many officers now consider that they need to do all the pieces inside their energy to make sure zero COVID infections since it’s the will of their prime chief, Xi Jinping.
    Hairdressers carrying protected fits reduce residents’ hair at a residential block which has turn out to be underneath lockdown in Xi’an in northwest China’s Shaanxi province on Sunday, Jan. 9, 2022. (Chinatopix Via AP, File)
    For the officers, virus management comes first. The folks’s lives, well-being and dignity come a lot later.
    The authorities has the assistance of an enormous military of neighborhood staff who perform the coverage with zeal and hordes of on-line nationalists who assault anybody elevating grievances or considerations. The tragedies in Xi’an have prompted some Chinese folks to query how these imposing the quarantine guidelines can behave like this and to ask who holds final duty.
    “It’s very easy to blame the individuals who committed the banality of evil,” a person known as @IWillNotResistIt wrote on Weibo, the Chinese social media platform. “If you and I become the screws in this gigantic machine, we might not be able to resist its powerful pull either.”
    “The banality of evil” is an idea Chinese intellectuals usually evoke in moments like Xi’an. It was coined by thinker Hannah Arendt, who wrote that Adolf Eichmann, one of many chief architects of the Holocaust, was an bizarre man who was motivated by “an extraordinary diligence in looking out for his personal advancement.”

    Chinese intellectuals are struck by what number of officers and civilians — usually pushed by skilled ambition or obedience — are keen to be the enablers of authoritarian insurance policies.
    When the coronavirus emerged in Wuhan two years in the past, it uncovered the weaknesses in China’s authoritarian system. Now, with sufferers dying of non-COVID ailments, residents going hungry and officers pointing fingers, the lockdown in Xi’an has proven how the nation’s political equipment has ossified, bringing a ruthlessness to its single-minded pursuit of a zero-COVID coverage.
    Commuters stroll alongside a road within the central enterprise district in Beijing, Thursday, Jan. 13, 2022. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
    Xi’an, the capital of Shaanxi province, is in a significantly better place than Wuhan in early 2020, when 1000’s of individuals died of the virus, overwhelming the town’s medical system. Xi’an has reported solely three COVID-related deaths, the final one in March 2020. The metropolis mentioned 95% of its adults had been vaccinated by July. In the most recent wave, it had reported 2,017 confirmed instances by Monday and no deaths.
    Still, it imposed a really harsh lockdown. Residents weren’t allowed to go away their compounds. Some buildings had been locked up. More than 45,000 folks had been moved to quarantine amenities.
    The metropolis’s well being code system, which is used to trace folks and implement quarantines, collapsed underneath heavy use. Deliveries largely disappeared. Some residents took to the web to complain that they didn’t have sufficient meals.
    But the lockdown guidelines had been assiduously adopted.
    A number of neighborhood volunteers made a younger man who ventured out to purchase meals learn a self-criticism letter in entrance of a video digital camera. “I only cared about whether I had food to eat,” the younger man learn, in keeping with a broadly shared video. “I didn’t take into account the serious consequences my behavior could bring to the community.” The volunteers later apologized, in keeping with The Beijing News, a state media outlet.
    Three males had been caught whereas escaping from Xi’an to the countryside, probably to keep away from the excessive prices of the lockdown. They hiked, biked and swam in wintry days and nights. Two of them had been detained by police, in keeping with native police and media experiences. Together they had been known as the “Xi’an ironmen” on the Chinese web.
    Then there have been the hospitals that denied sufferers entry to medical care and disadvantaged their family members of the prospect to say goodbye.
    The man who suffered chest ache as he was dying of a coronary heart assault waited six hours earlier than a hospital lastly admitted him. After his situation worsened, his daughter begged hospital staff to let her in and see him for the final time.
    A male worker refused, in keeping with a video she posted on Weibo after her father’s loss of life. “Don’t try to hijack me morally,” he mentioned within the video. “I’m just carrying out my duty.”

    A number of low-level Xi’an officers had been punished. The head of the town’s well being fee apologized to the lady who suffered the miscarriage. The normal supervisor of a hospital was suspended. On Friday, the town introduced that no medical facility might reject sufferers on the premise of COVID checks.
    But that was about it. Even the state broadcaster, China Central Television, commented that some native officers had been merely blaming their underlings. It appeared, the broadcaster wrote, solely low-level cadres have been punished for these issues.
    Since Wuhan, the Chinese web has devolved right into a parochial platform for nationalists to reward China, the federal government and the Communist Party. No dissent or criticism is tolerated, with on-line grievances attacked for offering ammunition for hostile overseas media.
    Despite asserting the town’s battle with the virus as a victory final week, the federal government isn’t relenting on a lot of the foundations, and it’s setting a really excessive bar for ending the lockdown. The celebration secretary of Shaanxi informed Xi’an officers Monday that their future pandemic management efforts ought to stay “strict.”
    “A needle-size loophole can funnel high wind,” he mentioned.
    This article initially appeared in The New York Times.