Supposedly the crematoriums in Beijing are working overtime (not sure if actually true).

Reported here too. But it was explained away by crematorium workers falling sick en masse as part of relaxations.

Not increased deaths from Covid.



in other news Shanghai suspends school in-person teaching for all but three most-senior years

So it seems bumpy but nothing really bad.

with a bit of luck, hospitals can cope

and honestly, unvaccinated people should pay their hospitals bills (and be the last getting treatment in pure Singapore style, throw the anti vaxxers under the bus finally!)

Since this is a travel thread I'm brainstorming how much travel they'd let under the emperor has no clothes phase goes on.

I suspect they will take the opportunity to reopen business travel - those that keep FDI going and keep jobs directly going very soon. Visitors who might go to hospital and video all those colds and to funeral homes and video all that smoke, not so much yet.

Reuters is still spitting out this same story (increased Covid deaths leads to crematoriums operating extra shifts), and everyone is running with it.

Seems they have changed Macau quarantine to 5 days home monitoring with no centralized quarantine. Need to be in Macau for 3 days before you can leave. I guess this means you can spend 3 days in a hotel in Macau then go to the Mainland quarantine free. If so, I think the mainland will end quarantine sooner rather than later.

Seems like people are getting a lot sicker than over here though. A lot of fevers of up to 40C/whatever that is in F. I'm guessing the Chinese vaccine isn't working as well as Pfizer/Moderna.

Not only not as effective, but the great vaccination campaign was, what, 18 months ago? Any effectiveness would have dwindled by now.
My cousin's teenage kid had a fever of 40C, and all they could get was 1 pill of cold/fever medication from a friend from another province. :(

You should advise your cousin's kid to get Paxlovid (or whatever the Chinese licensee calls it).

I think the issue is that people can't even get ibuprofen. Paxlovid is even harder to get and costs like $500 out of pocket.

Luckily I was able to procure a bunch of Paxlovid in the US and will be bringing with me to China.

This.
Some were first selling it for ~RMB 3000, and it went even higher after that.

What about the link that someone posted in the wx group (I didn't try to buy, but it seemed legit)?

ETA: I do recall that you need to be confirmed positive in the system in order to purchase through the link in question. The same goes for pharmacies at hospitals, which certainly had sufficient stock when I left China, but that was just before the policy changes (and ensuing spike in infections).

​​​​​

Hope everyone stays well if you are in China or in the process of returning to China. Not a lot of transparency in terms local cases and infection spread from PRC media and governent since the relaxation of Covid policy. A lof of rumors and Western media reporting seem to indicate worsening situation.

I have canceled my PRC trip until later in the Spring.

Stay Well!

You need to stay a minimum of 8 days (equal to the previous 5+3 regime) in Macau before you can enter China.

I'm not trying to defend the PRC here or anything else, but I recall this story from the Economist. With the usual caveats that I'm not a doctor/scientist nor can assure that the venerable publication hasn't been unduly influenced by the CCP, it does, at least, offer some hope that there is an element of protection similar to the mRNAs we've used in the West. Also, in my view, a more important focus isn't eliminating transmissibility, but rather allowing the inevitable spread to be adequately managed. In other words, we just need to reduce this to something we can live with, not unlike the seasonal flu. And, thus far, there is considerable evidence here in the West that these vaccines should be able to accomplish just that.

Of course, I'm not suggesting how the PRC or the Chinese people should handle this once in a lifetime pandemic, but after three years of this pro-longed suffering, I suspect we all just want to find an acceptable way to move forward, and return to living life and enjoying prosperity.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-de...s-mrna-vaccine

The above article dated April 19, 2022 is behind a paywall, I believe, but I do have a subscription.

Yeah, I haven't booked anything yet, but my plan is/was to return around early to mid-March.
But that may unfortunately coincide with the third wave of infection, so I may push it back by a few weeks.
I reckon by the time we go back, things will be a LOT easier than they were before though (no or less quarantine; cheaper flights, etc.), so that's a plus.

So we’ve gone from pack your own food supply for quarantine to pack your own panadol?

Yeah, pretty much. :eek:
You'll be everyone's friend right now if you have a stash of Tylenol/Paracetamol/Panadol and/or Ibuprofen.

Unfortunately you need to do both at the moment.

Although I did see some news today of Chengdu going to 2+3 for international arrivals.

Vaccine-induced antibodies from the ancestral vaccine against Omicron drop to effectively nil about 6-8 months after your 3rd shot (first booster). I got infected, probably in the SFO Centurion lounge, when I took off my N95 mask for all of 7-9 minutes to eat dinner, back at the end of June/beginning of July (last booster at that time was November 2021).

I'm guessing more cities will jump on that bandwagon, but I just checked ICN-CTU (because it's easy to get to Korea), and there's a nonstop flight on Thursdays at 7p that sells for $549.

You can probably make back the cost of a business class ticket on UA857 if you fill a suitcase with Kirkland-brand acetaminophen and resell it in the mainland

It’s not official but it’s looking like 0+3 begins next month. Here is the rumor from a HK source.


https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...4ddca6fdb.jpeg

Why not get CCTV to inform us of the decision?

"The company is registered in and named after Hong Kong, but most of its programmes are produced in mainland China." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HKSTV

Previously multiple source said Jan 9 would be the date of reopening, and it's around the same

I’m getting confirmation from my friends in the Shanghai government that the Jan 3rd date is accurate. Take from this what you will.

Anyhow, things will likely open very soon. I wonder how they will deal with lack of flights and visa processing.

That's great news, given the current situation quarantining inbound passengers who are mostly covid negative makes zero sense.

Not sure why all the panic from those having been vaccinated - even with Sinovac. I don't think anyone here is really elderly, either.

When the West decided to let Omicron run free, some countries had low vaccination rates as low as 50%, in Eastern Europe, where the hospital system can only be described as "worse than China". Some of those countries had Sinovac or Sputnik, or J&J.. not the "good" Moderna stuff.. still, people weren't dropping left and right. The difference is that in those countries quite some people might have had some contact with covid in earlier waves, but that's about it.

So.. I know that in HKG, for a while, it seems hospitals were overwhelmed? While for example in Singapore, but also much poorer countries like Thailand, nothing much happened when Omicron was given green light to become endemic..

I'll happily get my second booster, omicron-improved variant shot. But then, why worry?

Who is panicking here? Seems everyone is celebrating the end of the chairman's glorious zero COVID policy. I wish they had taken this obvious decision before locking me down for a few months earlier this year but I'll be happy that they are taking it now.

Ah, then I might have misunderstood.

Yeah, they should have learned from Singapore in early 2022, got vaccination rate up (If a one-party system is too weak to enforce 99% vaccination like Singapore, that's NOT a good sign) and opened up in late spring, I fully agree.

They lost 7-8 months AND opening up in the worst part of the year now AND their vaccination rate hasn't improved, more the contrary. [mod edit]

From a FT perspective, none. We’ve no skin in the game. Death toll of 1 or 10 million since new measures is irrelevant. Very very few of us live there permanently.

If we do, we may think different, but that’s OT.

Legitimate concerns are when reopening to inbound foreign travellers, what level of requirements imposed when we get there, what we need to bring more of.

Also, because we buy stuff from there, what’s the effect on the supply chain in the short term.

According to this Chengdu didn't go 2+3, but did introduce a 2+6 on a trial basis for some.

5+3, 2+6, next we will have 3.1415+4.8585, 1.618+6.382, 2.7182+5.2818, 6.022+1.978 ...

Wonder how long it will take for the airlines to resume regular passenger services.....if it's anything like CX and HKG, going to be unfortunately quite awhile before tourists and families can visit.

As long as the mainland opens up the border with HK, it'll be enough. Flights to HKG are now cheap and plentiful, so until PVG/PEK flights ramp up, one can just fly into HKG and catch a high speed train from West Kowloon station or take the ferry to Shenzhen airport and get a domestic flight from there.

I think the five ones policy and its downstream derivatives are a much more significant bottleneck than tourist demand.

The only reason flights were limited is to not overwhelm the quarantine hotels. Once hotel quarantine disappears, flights will be back with a vengeance.

I predict that they won't open those floodgates all at once (i.e. I envision a slow drip gradually becoming a modest stream). Of course, the usual caveats about predictions apply; it seems like each and every one of us has been proven dead wrong at least once.

Indeed, looking at how slow CX and CI have been in rebuilding their networks following the reopening in their respective regions, I'm hesitant to believe that the big 3 major Chinese airlines will quickly resume their network :(

Hoping by spring things are looking better, but not holding my hopes up.

I think that getting flights into china will be the biggest problem for the six months immediately after they lift the quarantine. This is bad news for those of us out of China at the moment looking to get back in, and for anyone who knowingly or unknowingly benefited from having mainland carriers offering cheap fares to Asia thereby keeping all the other airlines honest with their pricing.