Welcome to FT, Rickster!. .......Another thing to consider is taking a bottle of aspirin on every flight to China, and hand out two of them to everyone 2 hours before arrival.
A dumb but serious question. Can aspirin really help lower one's body temperature? If it works, I would consider using it.
A couple days ago in Chongqing I ran into an older Canadian couple who told me they were detained for 5 days in Beijing a week earlier. According to them hotel, food and overall treatment were rather poor.
Luckily Beijing was supposed to be their first stop on a month long tour of China so it didn't affect their itinerary much.
THE Shanghai Health Bureau yesterday eased some swine flu detection and prevention measures in the city.
It stopped on-board aircraft passenger temperature checks and ceased confinement of people in close contact with suspicious or confirmed swine flu sufferers in designated quarantine quarters.
Do you think they'll actually stop quarantining uninfected people?
This will speed things up immesnsely and is a very sensible move IMHO. Also note that those who have not actually contracted H1N1, but who were in close quarters with them, will be confined to their hotels and NOT carted off to hospital.
Note that the temperature check before passport control is still there, so if you show up as too hot on the thermal imaging then they'll want to take your temperature.
The rest of the apparatus is still in place of course, so the forms still have to be completed on the plane or on arrival, there are still temperature sensors just before passport control, and staff collecting forms and scrutinising you for the signs of flu.
To some of the posters above, it's important to keep all this in perspective. I have entered Mainland China 10 times over the last 2 months, by air and by land, and apart from getting pulled aside once have not ended up in quarantine. I live in Shanghai, know quite a lot of other expats and know no one who has been detained overnight. Indeed, I know more people who have been turned away by US CBP in the last year and forced to catch immediate return flights to China or Europe (something which does not stop me getting on a flight to the US).
I would of course never get on a flight into the Mainland if I thought I had a temperature, but beyond that have been getting on with my life as normal.
Border control and entry policies can be silly at the best of times, and China is no poster child in this regard, but that's the way of the world I guess.
It seems is the word of the day. The article is dated 7/5 and says checks ended the day before, which on my calendar is 7/4. Someone forgot to tell the folks at the airport. I have some lovely pictues of the moon suit brigade zapping a whole plane from the US at PVG at 7 PM Sunday 7/5 local arrival time. The good news: Everyone passed, no one got quarantined.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Flaflyer
It seems is the word of the day. The article is dated 7/5 and says checks ended the day before, which on my calendar is 7/4. Someone forgot to tell the folks at the airport. I have some lovely pictues of the moon suit brigade zapping a whole plane from the US at PVG at 7 PM Sunday 7/5 local arrival time. The good news: Everyone passed, no one got quarantined.
And I know someone who arrived at PVG T1 on Sunday afternoon whose plane did not get the moon suit treatment, arriving from HKG. The official press is usually pretty authoritative about this kind of thing so would expect the checks to stop completely within days, if they have not already stopped completely.
Saw this. It's interesting that it's only the 8 surrounding passengers and not 3 rows in front and behind. What does this mean for international travelers that don't have a home to be quarantined in?
Quote:
In China, the Ministry of Health said Wednesday that people in close contact with A/H1N1 flu patients will no longer be quarantined in specially reserved places, and patients with mild symptoms may receive treatment at home.
Close contacts now include people who diagnosed, treated, nursed or visited a patient, people who worked or lived with a patient, and people who contacted the spit or body fluid of a patient. And on aircraft, close contacts include eight passengers surrounding a patient, the notice said.
And I know someone who arrived at PVG T1 on Sunday afternoon whose plane did not get the moon suit treatment, arriving from HKG. The official press is usually pretty authoritative about this kind of thing so would expect the checks to stop completely within days, if they have not already stopped completely.
In my experience HKG flights didn't ever get this treatment, even at the height of the H1N1 scare. It only seemed to be flights from Japan, Korea and Western Countries that had this treatment.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by travelinmanS
In my experience HKG flights didn't ever get this treatment, even at the height of the H1N1 scare. It only seemed to be flights from Japan, Korea and Western Countries that had this treatment.
I can only speak from personal experience, but I have been on 3 separate Dragonair arrivals at PVG that all got this treatment in the past.
I just got back from China and after we landed at PVG, we were zapped by the stewardesses. One young man, (who wore a mask and coughed the whole trip) was told to splash some cold water on his red face, by a stewardess. The Hazmat Suited Brigade came on board and zapped everyone. I saw them zap a man near us a few times. Thank goodness no one was detained.
Why take an aspirin if you don't have a fever? It is not necessary to do anything.
I have some lovely pictues of the moon suit brigade zapping a whole plane from the US at PVG at 7 PM Sunday 7/5 local arrival time. The good news: Everyone passed, no one got quarantined.
Passed inspection
