Chinese man fined $42,500 for hiding symptoms, contact with virus patients

BEIJING • A Chinese man has been fined 200,000 yuan (S$42,500) and given a two-year suspended prison sentence after concealing contact with Covid-19 patients and flouting quarantine, as the country toughens its restrictions in an uphill battle to eliminate the virus.

The man, surnamed Cao, did not disclose having stayed in a hotel with Covid-19 patients and that he developed a fever and other virus-related symptoms during a business trip to Vietnam, according to local media reports. He also broke quarantine rules after returning home in April, sneaking out of his hotel room to meet friends.

A court in the south-western province of Guangxi, which borders Vietnam, handed down the fine and prison sentence, which was suspended for three years.

Cao, along with four other people he travelled to Vietnam with, tested positive for Covid-19 after returning home. The group was immediately isolated and did not spread the virus in the community.

Genetic sequencing showed they were infected with the Delta variant, which has caused some of China's most widespread outbreaks after the strain breached the country's tightly controlled borders in recent months.

The Chinese mainland and Hong Kong are the last holdouts of the so-called zero-Covid approach, which worked well at eliminating cases in the first year of the pandemic but has been abandoned by places like Singapore and Australia because it is almost impossible to maintain against the more contagious Delta variant.

People flouting Covid-19 restrictions also face stiff penalties elsewhere. For instance, in South Korea, those who break quarantine face fines of 10 million won (S$11,455).

BLOOMBERG