China announces sweeping changes to anti-COVID regime

China has announced the most sweeping changes to its resolute anti-COVID regime since the pandemic began three years ago.

The changes include allowing infected people with mild symptoms to quarantine at home and dropping testing for people travelling domestically.

The policy changes were announced after Xi, who regards China’s relentless fight against COVID as one of his main achievements, chaired a meeting of the Communist Party’s Politburo on Tuesday.

The relaxation of rules is the clearest sign that Beijing is pivoting away from its zero-COVID policy to let people live with the disease.

But health officials still warn that trends in deaths will be closely watched in case a return to tougher measures is needed.

Many of the changes announced by the National Health Commission (NHC) reflected steps already taken in various cities and regions in recent days, following protests against COVID controls that were the biggest demonstration of public discontent since President Xi Jinping came to power in 2012.

Citizens cheered the prospect of a shift that could see China slowly emerging back into the world three years after the virus was first identified in the central city of Wuhan in late 2019.

For nearly three years, China has managed COVID as a disease on par with bubonic plague and cholera and as cases spread earlier this year, whole communities were locked down, sometimes for months.

Shanghai was among the first to announce that it would put the new home quarantine guidelines in place and also remove rules on travellers entering the city.

Also Read: China’s trade suffers huge decline amid COVID-19 restrictions

The Shanghai Disneyland theme park will reopen for visitors on Thursday.

Foreign businesses in China also hope the changes could mark a shift to a broader opening up.

“We need the business environment here to return to a level of predictability whereby companies can return to normal operations,” Colm Rafferty, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, said in a statement.

But NHC spokesperson Mi Feng told a news conference that any changes to measures regarding inbound travel would be “gradual”.

Major cities across China, including Beijing and Shanghai, were gripped by protests last month, which started to subside amid a heavy police presence and various restrictions being lifted in different parts of the country.

Officials have not linked any of the changes, made on Wednesday or earlier, to the protests.

Reuters/Zainab Sa’id