2 billion people to travel in China’s “Great Migration” in next 40 days

Shanghai:

China on Saturday marked the first day of “Chun Yun”, a 40-day period of Lunar New Year travel known as the world’s largest annual migration, marked by a huge increase in travelers and the spread of COVID-19. Known as an epidemic. Infection.

This Lunar New Year public holiday, which officially runs through January 21, will be the first since 2020 without domestic travel restrictions.

The past month has seen China witness the dramatic collapse of its “zero-Covid” regime after historic protests against a policy that included frequent testing, restricted movement, massive lockdowns and massive damage to the world’s No. 2 economy.

Investors are hoping the reopening will eventually reinvigorate the $17-trillion economy, which has suffered the slowest growth in nearly half a century.

But the sudden changes have exposed many of China’s 1.4 billion population to the virus for the first time, triggering a wave of infections that is overwhelming some hospitals, emptying pharmacy shelves of the drug and Long lines are forming at the cremation grounds.

China’s transport ministry said on Friday it expects more than 2 billion passengers to travel in the next 40 days, a year-on-year increase of 99.5% and reaching 70.3% of 2019’s travel numbers.

Reaction to that news online was mixed, with some comments appreciating the freedom of returning to hometown and celebrating the Lunar New Year with family for the first time in years.

However, with many others saying they will not travel this year, concern about infecting elderly relatives remains a common theme.

One such comment on Weibo such as Twitter said, “For fear of bringing back the poison, I dare not go back to my hometown.”

There are widespread concerns that the mass migration of workers from cities to their hometowns will lead to a rise in infections in smaller towns and rural areas, which lack ICU beds and ventilators to deal with them.

Julian Evans-Pritchard, senior China economist at Capital Economics, acknowledged that risk in a Friday note, but added that “in the big cities that make up China’s economy, it looks like the worst has passed”.

The current wave of infections may have already peaked in most areas, said Ernan Cui, analyst at Gavecal Dragonomics in Beijing, noting that “there was not much difference between urban and rural areas,” citing several online surveys. “

reopen the border

Sunday marks the reopening of China’s border with Hong Kong and the end of China’s requirement to quarantine international travelers. It effectively opened the door for many Chinese people to travel abroad for the first time since the borders were closed nearly three years ago, without the fear of being quarantined upon their return.

More than a dozen countries are now demanding COVID tests from Chinese travelers, as the World Health Organization said China’s official virus data underestimated the true extent of its outbreak.

Chinese officials and state media have defended their handling of the outbreak, downplayed the severity of the surge and denounced foreign travel requirements for its residents.

On Saturday in Hong Kong, people who had made an appointment had to queue for about 90 minutes at a center for PCR tests required for travel to countries including mainland China.

further treatment

For most of the pandemic, China poured resources into a massive PCR testing program to track and trace COVID-19 cases, but the focus is now shifting to vaccines and treatments.

In Shanghai, for example, the city government announced on Friday the end of free PCR tests for residents from January 8.

A circular published on Saturday by four government ministries signaled the redistribution of financial resources for treatment, outlining a plan for public finance to subsidize 60% of treatment costs by March 31.

Meanwhile, sources told Reuters that China is in talks with Pfizer Inc to secure a license that would allow domestic drugmakers to make and distribute a generic version of the US firm’s COVID-19 antiviral drug Paxlovid in China. will allow.

Many Chinese have been attempting to buy the drug overseas and it has been shipped to China.

On the vaccine front, China’s CanSino Biologics Inc announced that it has begun trial production for its COVID-19 mRNA booster vaccine, known as CS-2034.

China has relied on nine domestically developed COVID vaccines approved for use, including inactivated vaccines but none adapted to target the highly-infectious Omicron variant and its offshoots currently in circulation has not been done.

The country has an overall vaccination rate above 90%, according to government data released last month, but the rate for adults who get booster shots drops to 57.9% and 42.3% for those 80 and older.

China reported three new COVID deaths in the mainland on Friday, bringing its official virus death toll to 5,267, the lowest in the world. International health experts believe Beijing’s narrow definition of COVID deaths does not reflect an accurate count, and some predict more than a million deaths this year.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)