‘ Strictest’ rules rolled out
▶ New year outbreaks could be catastrophic: expert
China has rolled out measures to guide the public on their return journeys to their hometowns and urged them to stay in their working cities during the upcoming Spring Festival holidays. Among the measures are mandatory nucleic acid tests within seven days of travel, 14- day home monitoring and an extra bonus as a stimulus for those who choose to stay.
At least 29 provinces and municipalities have taken such steps in a bid to avert the risks of the virus’ spread during the chunyun ( travel rush) in Spring Festival, which is known as the world’s biggest annual human migration.
According to Chinese authorities on Wednesday, this year’s chunyun would see some 1.7 billion trips in total with a daily average of 40 million trips. The number is 40 percent lower than in 2019 but 10 percent higher than in 2020, officials said.
People must show negative nucleic acid test results within seven days before their trips. For those returning to rural areas, they also have to undergo a 14- day health monitoring at home after arrival, according to a national level anti- epidemic plan released by the National Health Commission on Wednesday.
Observers reached by the Global Times said such strict steps will make a large majority think twice about their decision to return home during the holidays.
Wang Guangfa, a respiratory expert at Peking University First Hospital, said that the potential risks of a COVID- 19 rebound should not be underestimated, given the large scale of people who travel during chunyun. “Otherwise, previous maximum efforts that China made since last year would be in vain,” he said.
Officials also stressed that China is facing a grim and complicated epidemic situation, with outbreaks in several provinces and multiple chains of transmission that have surfaced in the same places. In the past week, there were 757 newly confirmed local cases nationwide, and the number of close contacts under medical observation was at its highest level since October, officials said.
A local government official surnamed Hu from the Heguo township in Xingai, North China’s Hebei Province told the Global Times on Wednesday that holding a negative nucleic acid test is mandatory for any visitors, no matter whether they came from low- or high- risk regions.
Chinese authorities emphasized the anti- epidemic controls in villages during holidays, where loopholes and blind spots could exist, as the lessons of the Hebei and Heilongjiang outbreaks showed. They ordered countylevel emergency response teams to remain in “emergency” mode during the festival.
Villages across the country should require nucleic acid tests for all returnees and carry out routine environmental tests on social venues such as chess and mahjong entertainment houses.
2021 chunyun would see some 1.7 billion trips in total with a daily average of 40 million trips, up by 10 percent than 2020.