China may announce 10 new COVID-19 easing steps on Wednesday–sources

Workers in protective suits remove bags of medical waste outside a building where residents isolate at home as coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreaks continue in Beijing, China December 5, 2022. REUTERS

HONG KONG — China may announce 10 new COVID-19 easing measures as early as Wednesday, two sources with knowledge of the matter told Reuters, supplementing 20 unveiled in November that set off a wave of COVID easing steps nationwide.

Three years of zero-tolerance measures, from shuttered borders to frequent lockdowns, have battered China’s economy, fueling last month the mainland’s biggest show of public discontent since President Xi Jinping took power in 2012.

Management of the disease may be downgraded as soon as January, to the less strict Category B from the current top-level Category A of infectious disease, the sources said on Monday, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The National Health Commission did not immediately respond to a Reuters fax message seeking comment.

Last week, Vice Premier Sun Chunlan said China was facing “a new situation” as pathogenicity of the Omicron virus weakened, becoming the first high-ranking official to publicly acknowledge that the new variant’s disease-causing ability had diminished.

Many major cities have since started to lift wide lockdowns, reduce regular PCR testing and end checks for negative tests in public spaces, such as subway stations and parks.

The national health authority had earlier announced a score of new measures on Nov. 11, in the effort to improve COVID management and strike a better balance between epidemic control and shoring up the economy.

China will allow home quarantine for some of those testing positive, among the supplementary measures set to be announced, two sources told Reuters last week.

That would be a key change in strategy from earlier this year, when entire communities were locked down, sometimes for weeks, after just one positive case.

Last month, new, easier quarantine rules required just the lockdown of affected buildings.

Since January 2020, China has classified COVID-19 as a Category B infectious disease but managed it under Category A protocols, giving local authorities the power to quarantine patients and their close contacts and lock down regions.

Category A covers diseases such as bubonic plague and cholera, while Category B groups SARS, AIDS and anthrax, with diseases such as influenza, leprosy and mumps placed in Category C.

But more than 95% of China’s cases are asymptomatic and mild, with few deaths. In such circumstances, sticking to the Category A strategy is not in line with science, state media outlet Yicai said on Sunday, citing an unidentified expert.

COVID-19 could be downgraded to Category B management or even Category C, the expert told Yicai.

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