On 28th June, the Chinese State Council Joint Prevention and Control Team issued a new version of the country's Pandemic Prevention Plan. The new plan reduces the quarantine period for international arrivals to seven days of centralised quarantine followed by a further three days of home quarantine ("7+3"). Quarantine is still required for both vaccinated and unvaccinated travellers.

This period is substantially shorter than the previous requirement. Most parts of the country previously asked for “14+7” (14 days of centralised quarantine and seven days of home quarantine), although several cities had already reduced this to "7+7" or "10+7".

Analysis

The shortened quarantine time will make travel to China more convenient. Along with previous relaxed restrictions on work visas, this is a positive sign for UK institutions looking to cooperate with Chinese partners or deliver teaching to students on transnational education programmes.

However, China's restrictions continue to be much stricter than those imposed by other countries and travel to the country is still substantially more difficult than before the pandemic. Along with quarantine requirements for international travel, many cities or provinces also still require a period of quarantine for travellers coming from other parts of China.

Source:

http://www.nhc.gov.cn/jkj/s3577/202206/de224e7784fe4007b7189c1f1c9d5e85.shtml