China Covid: Spain among latest countries to announce testing

Spain is among the latest countries to announce it will impose Covid testing on visitors from China, following similar decisions in the US and India.

Its current Covid surge has caused wariness, with about 5,000 cases being reported a day.

However, analysts believe the actual daily case load may be almost double.

Spain has said it will make travellers from China show proof of a full set of vaccinations or undergo mandatory testing.

It is the second European country after Italy to introduce mandatory screening for Chinese visitors.

The EU's disease prevention agency has said that such measures are not justified in Europe, because of the levels of immunity and the fact that variants spreading in China were already present on the continent.

The World Health Organization, however, has said it was "understandable" that some countries had decided to impose restrictions and urged Beijing to be more forthcoming about its Covid numbers.

China's foreign ministry said earlier this week that its "epidemic situation" overall was "predictable and under control".

But the true toll of daily cases and deaths in China is unknown as officials have stopped requiring cases to be reported, and changed classifications for Covid deaths.

South Korea and Israel also announced on Friday that they will introduce testing requirements.

South Korean Prime Minister Han Duck-soo said that travellers from China would need to have a negative PCR or antigen test before boarding flights to South Korea. They will also need to undergo a PCR test within the first day of their arrival in South Korea.

Israel, meanwhile, has ordered foreign airlines not to allow people to travel from China unless they have tested negative and asked its own citizens to avoid unnecessary travel there.

Not all countries have announced controls. Germany has joined Australia, France, Portugal and the UK, announcing it would not be introducing new rules for travellers from China.

However, Germany's health minister has said the country is seeking a co-ordinated system to monitor variants across European airports.

China's decision this week to reopen its borders on 8 January marks the end of the country's controversial zero-Covid policy, which President Xi Jinping had personally endorsed.

As the rest of the world transitioned to living with the virus, Beijing maintained an eradication policy involving mass testing and stringent lockdowns, to the detriment of the economy and public morale.

In November, the frustration spilled on to the streets in rare protests against Mr Xi and his government. A week later, Beijing began to roll back the restrictions.