They came for a beach holiday. Now they're trapped in China's latest Covid lockdown

 

The Chinese resort city of Sanya is known for its sandy beaches, high-end hotels and duty-free shopping.

Known for its sandy beaches, luxury resorts and duty-free shopping, the city of Sanya on China's tropical Hainan island has long been a popular getaway for Chinese middle- and upper-class families.

Since the weekend, however, what began as a leisurely escape has become a stress-filled travel nightmare for tens of thousands of holidaymakers, who are trapped in a sudden lockdown imposed by authorities to curb a spiraling Covid outbreak.

Driven by a highly infectious Omicron subvariant -- which authorities blame on contact with overseas seafood dealers at a fishing port -- the outbreak has infected more than 1,200 people in Sanya since August 1. It has also spread to a dozen other cities and counties in Hainan, infecting more than 200 others.

That is a major outbreak by the standards of China's zero-Covid policy, which aims to swiftly snuff out local flareups with snap lockdowns, mass testing, extensive contact tracing and quarantine.

On Saturday, the Sanya government hastily locked down the city of a million people, including some 80,000 tourists. Visitors wishing to leave must show five negative Covid tests taken over seven days, and authorities did not specify when the measures would be lifted.

Public transportation was suspended, people's movements inside the city were restricted to emergency services, and transport links were halted.

More than 80% of flights leaving Sanya were canceled on Saturday, according to data from flight tracking company Variflight. All trains departing from the city were also canceled, state broadcaster CCTV said Saturday.

The mass, sudden flight cancellations led to scenes of chaos at the airport on Saturday, when some passengers who had already boarded were ordered to deplane, according to state media reports.

A video widely circulated on Chinese social media shows a local official trying in vain to placate dozens of frustrated travelers outside the airport police station.

Speaking into a megaphone, the official promised the government would provide free food and hotel accommodation to travelers stranded at the airport, as a ring of police officers stood around him and pushed back the crowd.

"I want to go home! Go home! Go home!" the crowd chanted in response.

A medical worker conducts Covid testing for a child on August 7 in Sanya.

 

Forced stays

China's borders have been closed to international tourists since the start of the pandemic, meaning tourist hotspots like Sanya rely even more on domestic travelers.

The Sanya government said Saturday that tourists with canceled flights could book discounted hotel rooms. But for some families, the forced week-long stay may still come at a heavy price -- especially as the Chinese economy has been battered by zero-Covid.

On Sunday, state-run news website The Paper reported that a family of 13 from the southwestern city of Chengdu would need to spend about $26,600 for an extra week at their five-star hotel, including charges of more than $100 per person for lunch and dinner buffets.

The report caused a stir on Chinese social media, with a related hashtag attracting 270 million views on China's microblogging site Weibo as of Monday afternoon. Many comments expressed sympathy toward the family, while others questioned why they didn't move into a cheaper hotel. After the outcry, the family said they were able to access cheaper food options at the hotel.

Other social media posts by trapped tourists in Sanya accused some hotels of raising their prices to cash in on the forced stays. At a news conference Sunday, the Sanya government vowed to look into the complaints.

It said more than 3,200 tourists stuck at the airport on Saturday would be given seven days of accommodation and food. And about 5,000 workers had been sent to Hainan from other parts of the country to help with a mass Covid testing drive, officials added.

When will it end?

For many stranded tourists, the biggest concern is whether they will be allowed to leave after seven days. They fear the lockdown could be extended if the number of infections rises despite the restrictions.

Schools in China are due to reopen after the summer break in three weeks, and some companies may not allow employees to work remotely for weeks on end.

On Monday, Sanya airport canceled all of its 418 flights, according to flight-tracking site Variflight.

Among the tourists stuck were Shanghai residents who had gone to Hainan for summer holidays after enduring a grueling two-month lockdown in the Chinese financial hub earlier this year.

A foreign resident of Shanghai who arrived in Sanya on July 26 said he had to leave his hotel last Thursday because it was requisitioned by the local government as a quarantine facility. The hotel only gave him a day's notice and left him to figure out alternative accommodation, he said.

Over the past five days, he has waited in long lines for six Covid tests, he said.

"This situation going forward is unsustainable," said the tourist, who requested not to be named over fears of a nationalistic blowback. "It's a little bit like Russian roulette on where you go, and whether or not that area is gonna get locked down."

For many travelers mindful of the country's Covid restrictions, Hainan had been considered a safe place because in the past it has reported very few cases.

Other tourist hotspots have recently been struck by abrupt lockdown too. Last month, more than 2,000 tourists were trapped in the resort town of Beihai in southern China, after a lockdown was imposed over 500 infections.

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Beijing imposes mainland China's first Covid vaccine mandate in face of Omicron subvariant

People stand in line at a coronavirus testing site in Beijing on July 2.

 

Beijing on Wednesday announced a Covid-19 vaccine mandate for residents to enter public venues, becoming the first city in mainland China to do so as it attempts to contain a highly infectious Omicron subvariant.

From July 11, people will need to show proof of vaccination to enter a wide range of public places in the Chinese capital, including cinemas, libraries, museums, gyms, stadiums and training centers, a city health official told a news briefing Wednesday.

People who are "not suitable" for vaccination will be exempted from the requirement, the official added, without clarifying how they can provide proof for exemption.

It also remains unclear how people who received vaccination overseas can satisfy the requirement. China's health code systems -- which are used to show proof of vaccination -- do not currently recognize foreign vaccines, and those who were inoculated abroad have not been able to get their vaccinations registered.

Places that have limited capacity or where reservations are needed are required to prioritize entry to vaccinated customers.

Senior citizens visiting venues offering activities specifically for the elderly, such as recreational centers and game rooms, should be vaccinated as soon as possible, the official said.

The vaccine mandate comes as Beijing reported three cases of the BA.5.2 Omicron subvariant, which is highly transmissible and capable of escaping antibodies. An outbreak of the new subvariant has already shut down the northwestern city of Xi'an, where entertainment, sports and religious venues have been closed -- and restaurants limited to takeaway and delivery services -- until next Wednesday.

A medical worker takes a swab sample at a nucleic acid testing station in Beijing on July 6.

 

Lag in elderly vaccination rate

China remains an outlier for its continued zero-Covid approach, which has seen cities across the country -- including Beijing and Shanghai -- recently placed under full or partial lockdown. The strategy -- which relies on mass testing, quarantine and snap lockdowns to stamp out any resurgence of the virus -- has wrecked economic activity.

Chinese authorities have ramped up efforts to boost vaccination rates, especially among the elderly population, since Omicron caused successive outbreaks this year.

In Beijing, residents are already required to show proof of a negative Covid test taken within 72 hours to enter all public places.

The city has also required people who work in epidemic prevention and control, health care, public transport, delivery and other higher risks sectors to be fully vaccinated.

As of January, 98% of Beijing's over 20 million residents have been fully vaccinated, including 12 million people who have received a booster shot, according to a government statement.

But the vaccination rate among the elderly is lower. As of April, 80% of Beijing residents over 60 had been vaccinated, state news agency Xinhua reported.

Residents line up to get a throat swab at a testing site in Beijing, on July 4.

 

On Chinese social media, users were quick to point out that Beijing's vaccine mandate appeared to contradict national health authorities' guidance that vaccination should be voluntary.

"When did voluntary vaccination become mandatory?" a comment asked on Weibo, China's Twitter-like platform.

Last September, the National Health Commission said it was wrong for local governments to impose restrictions on movement for unvaccinated people in order to speed up the inoculation campaign -- and that such policies should be corrected in a timely manner.

"Covid-19 vaccination should be based on the principles of informed consent, and (be) voluntary," Wu Liangyou, deputy head of the commission, told a news conference.

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Chinese censors scrub internet after senior party official gives speech on timeline of zero-Covid in Beijing

Health workers take swab samples to be tested for Covid-19 at a makeshift testing site along a street in Beijing on May 11, 2022.

 

Chinese censors scrambled to delete what appears to be a misleading quote by a senior Communist Party official published in state media Monday, which claimed the "zero-Covid" policy would remain in place in Beijing "for the next five years," in an effort to tame an online backlash.

Beijing Daily, the official Communist Party newspaper for the Chinese capital, earlier reported that the city's party chief, Cai Qi, said Monday that "for the next five years, Beijing will resolutely implement Covid-19 pandemic control measures and uphold the 'zero-Covid' policy to prevent imported cases from coming in and domestic cases from rebounding."

The reported reference by Cai, who is a close ally of Chinese President Xi Jinping, to "the next five years" sparked a huge backlash on Chinese social media. In response, Beijing Daily removed the line, describing it as an "editing error" while leaving his other remarks about pandemic controls intact.

CNN reviewed the entire speech and while the published quote from Beijing Daily was misleading, Cai did discuss at length the possibility of keeping zero-Covid policies in place in the capital over the next five-year period.

The pandemic controls that would stay in place include routine PCR tests, strict entry rules, regular health checks in residential neighborhoods and public venues, as well as rigorous monitoring and testing for people entering and leaving Beijing, state media quoted Cai as saying.

"I have to rethink whether I should continue to stay in Beijing in the long term," one user wrote on Weibo, China's Twitter-like platform.

"For the next five years...what is the point of being alive even," another user said.

Weibo has since banned the hashtag "for the next five years" from its platform.

In early May, Xi doubled down on the zero-Covid policy in a meeting of the Communist Party's Politburo Standing Committee, the country's top decision-making body, ordering officials and all sectors of society to adhere to the "decisions and plans" of the leadership.

US Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns said in an online Brookings Institution event on June 16 that he expected China to keep its zero-Covid policy in place until "the beginning months of 2023," based on signals from the Chinese government.

For months, cities across China -- including Beijing and Shanghai -- have been placed under full or partial lockdown because of the strict zero-Covid policy, wreaking havoc on economic activity and hurting the job market. In May, the unemployment rate for people aged 16-24 hit a record high 18.4%.

China continues to shut down entire communities and cities over just a handful of Covid cases. All positive cases and close contacts are sent to government quarantine.

China reported 23 locally transmitted Covid-19 cases nationwide on Sunday, with Beijing and Shanghai each recording four cases, according to the country's National Health Commission.

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