I'd categorize that as doing the right thing for the wrong reason. And that lack of any sort of mandatory quarantines on US citizens flying the same routes Chinese citizens were banned from taking made it effectively useless (if it was doing the right thing for the right reason, it would have been followed up with mandatory quarantines).

Agreed, especially given China's public admission that their existing vaccines aren't very good. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/11/w...d-vaccine.html

I suspect the follow-up will be "we need to keep the border controls and mandatory quarantines in place until our improved vaccines are ready in ~late 2022."

I think they'll make the call after the Tokyo Olympics. There is always the option of holding it with no overseas visitors. Quarantining just the athletes should be no problem, as the Australians successfully demonstrated with the Australian Open.

It didn't matter in the end though, as all the lineages from China direct died out. Only the one that came via Europe survives today.

I wouldn't even say it was the right thing. The right thing would have been to quarantine arrivals. (Not that it would have made much difference, the horse had long since left the barn.)

the language of the ban does not refer to Chinese nationality at all (or any specific nationality, really, other than that of the United States)
I am not commenting on the remainder of the question, as others here have done so

That's pretty much how it works with most viruses. We don't have 50 different influenza strains circulating from the last 50 seasons. A few strains typically become dominant, others die out, and new ones evolve from the dominant ones.

Well the right thing would have been for the US CDC to have not botched the test kits and to have started producing them as early as December, so that all of the cases that already slipped through could be tracked down and transmission halted.

We didn't have the sequence or samples, we couldn't do the test kits then.

Be careful about trying to book with DL miles from China (or most of Asia) to the USA through Europe. This isn't a legal routing for DL (even during IROPs that are DL's fault) and will require two separate award tickets. If somehow they're not issued as two fare components on the same ticket/PNR, you could be denied boarding for not being admissible (I assume) for the EU/France. There could also be issues with checking luggage through: if this isn't done when you check in at PVG, you would need to enter France to claim and recheck the bags, which again gets to the same issues of whether you're admissible as well as needing to satisfy additional testing/quarantine/documentation requirements.

Thanks for your advice. My current first choice is now KE. The flights don't show up online because of the overnight layover, but I can easily book them over the phone (with fee waived). I don't think DL will pay for my hotel near ICN; hopefully DL or KE can simply book a room for me.

Many of the ICN airport hotels are quite far from ICN, although you can get to some in downtown Seoul in about the same amount of time; they need to be close to the train station or subway line from the airport. OTOH, I've never explored how one gets from T2 to the train or subway station, which is outside from T1. [I don't know whether the lines were extended to T2 and given a new station or whether some long shuttle bus ride is necessary.]

It's not cheap, but I've generally liked the Grand Hyatt ICN (not to be confused with the GH Seoul, which is IMO in an inconvenient location near downtown). It has shuttle service to each terminal every twenty minutes (when I last stayed), and is also walkable (through a surface parking lot) from T1. It's about as close and convenient to the airport as it gets at ICN.

DL and KE use the new T2 at ICN. It's new and spacious, with some Korean cultural exhibits if you have time to kill. The KE lounges are disappointing, IMO much worse than when everything was in T1. For the TPAC flight, you might have an option of a very late afternoon departure which would give you most of a day to spend in Seoul if you wish.

If your trip is in May, I doubt that you can enter Korea without subjecting to quarantine. You may want to search up for the airside transit hotel at ICN.

Correct, visa exemption is currently suspended for South Korea. So unless you have an actual visa issued after the pandemic started then you can't enter Korea at all.

Journey status : Conditional to board.
Based on information last updated on Apr 19 2021 12:00 am GMT
Shanghai Pudong International Airport
China
Seoul Incheon International Airport| April 19, 2021
Republic of Korea (South)
Please check the messages below to see if travel is permitted.

• Visa is not required for transit through Republic of Korea (South).
• All passengers must complete the "Health Declaration Form" at ??????? on entry and exit from China.
  
  The form will only be valid for 24 hours starting from being completed.
  

Additional Information

• Visa exemption is temporarily suspended due to the outbreak of Covid-19. This does not apply to crew members.
  
• Visa or additional documentation is required if the passenger leaves the international transit area of the airport, due to the outbreak of Covid-19.
  
• Passengers are not required to quarantine on arrival in Korea (South) provided travelling under the 'Business Track' scheme, due to the outbreak of Covid-19.

1. according to the Korean government, stays of less than 24 hours are not subject to quarantine
2. I like the lesser hotels because the area is cool. All of them have shuttle buses