Although Beijing also demands a negative COVID test result from anyone who lands in China, officials last week threatened retaliation against countries mandating testing for people arriving from China.
China’s embassy in Seoul said on its official WeChat account that it would adjust its latest visa rules subject to the removal of South Korea’s “discriminatory entry restrictions” against China.
Kyodo quoted several travel industry sources as saying that China has also told travel agencies that it has stopped issuing new visas to Japan.
China has dismissed criticism over its data as politically motivated attempts to smear its “success” in tackling the pandemic, saying any future mutations are likely to be more infectious but less harmful .
State media continued to downplay the seriousness of the outbreak on Tuesday.
An article in Health Times, managed by the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Communist Party, quoted several officials as saying that infections were declining in the capital Beijing and several Chinese provinces.
Kan Quan, director of the Henan provincial epidemic prevention and control office, said the infection rate in the central province of 100 million people was about 90% as of January 6.
Beijing’s acting mayor Yin Yong said the capital is also peaking. Li Pan, deputy director of the Municipal Health Commission in Chongqing city, said the peak was reached on 20 December.
In Jiangsu province, the peak was reached on December 22, while in Zhejiang province “the first wave of infections has passed smoothly,” officials said. The two cities in southern Guangdong province, China’s manufacturing heartland, reached their peak before the end of the year.
Pfizer Criticism
The yuan rose to a nearly five-month high on Tuesday as financial markets saw the latest border restrictions as a mere inconvenience.
Although daily flights in and out of China are still a tenth of pre-COVID levels, businesses across Asia, including South Korean and Japanese shop owners, Thai tour bus operators and K-pop groups, are keeping their lips on the prospect. are licking More Chinese tourists.
Spending abroad by Chinese shoppers was a $250 billion per year market before COVID.
The retaliation against South Korea and Japan was not the only ongoing COVID conflict in China.
State media have also taken a jibe at Pfizer Inc over the pricing of its Covid treatment Paxlovid.
Nationalist tabloid Global Times said in an editorial, “It is no secret that US capital forces have already amassed considerable wealth from the world by selling vaccines and drugs, and the US government is coordinating.”
Pfizer Chief Executive Albert Bourla said Monday that the company is in discussions with Chinese authorities about the price of Paxlovid, but not over licensing a generic version in China.
The sudden change in COVID policies has sickened many hospitals, while smaller towns were left scrambling to secure basic anti-fever drugs.
Yu Weishi, chairman of Youcare Pharmaceutical Group, told Reuters his firm last month increased production of its anti-fever drug fivefold to one million boxes per day.
Wang Lili, general manager of CR Double Crane, another pharmaceutical firm, told Reuters that intravenous drips were their most sought-after product.
The company has closed weekends since January 5 to meet demand.
“We’re running 24/7,” Wang said.