Covid-19 outbreaks in China's top holiday spots fuel fears of spread
Country reports worst week of infections since mid-May as travellers head home
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BEIJING • China reported its worst week of Covid-19 infections since mid-May, fuelled by outbreaks in vacation hot spots that risk spreading across the country as travellers return home.
The country reported 2,678 cases for Thursday, down from 3,424 a day earlier. Still, there were more than 18,000 new local infections in the seven days till Thursday, China's worst week since mid-May, amid outbreaks in Hainan, Tibet and Xinjiang that left tourists stranded and threw the travel plans of thousands into disarray.
The tropical island of Hainan, which is experiencing the country's worst outbreak since Shanghai's lockdown in the spring, reported 1,499 cases, down from 2,018 on Wednesday.
More than 100,000 of the 150,000 tourists left stranded by the island's sudden lockdown this month have left, China News reported, though they will need to quarantine for three days upon their return home.
China's Vice-Premier and Covid-19 czar Sun Chunlan is in Hainan to guide virus control efforts amid tentative signs that the situation may be stabilising.
Haikou, the capital, said it would end a 10-day lockdown yesterday if no more infections were found outside of the community for Thursday.
The city's bus routes that do not pass through high-or medium-risk areas resumed operation yesterday, though other places remain under curbs.
Ms Sun's trip underscores the seriousness of the outbreak in the region, and concern from Beijing over Hainan's ability to handle the virus.
It also highlights fears that people returning from popular vacation destinations and other areas where flare-ups are occurring could bring the virus with them.
That has been a problem in Tibet, with returning travellers seeding outbreaks in places like Shanghai and Qinghai.
Anyone travelling from the region must quarantine, adding further disruption for many tourists.
A decision by officials in Yunnan province to deny entry to travellers from Tibet over the weekend because of a lack of quarantine facilities created a traffic jam of over 6km, despite police urging residents to avoid the routes where traffic was backed up.
Tibet reported a drop in cases to 680 from 889. Elsewhere, the north-western Xinjiang region saw its daily cases drop to 256 from 269, while Shanghai detected three cases.
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