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Outbreaks in two Chinese provinces could threaten holiday plans

27 September 2021 18:56 (UTC +04:00)

Cases of Covid-19 persist in two Chinese provinces, and are threatening people’s plans for an upcoming national holiday, APA reports citing BBC.

Golden Week - from 1-7 October - is fast approaching, the second biggest travel period in China after the Lunar New Year.

This year, 650 million Chinese are expected to travel for the festivities. The holiday begins with China’s National Day, and China’s answer to Chris Whitty, Zhong Nanshan, has this year sung a song to mark the country's "birthday".

However, cases of Covid-19 are still being identified daily in two Chinese provinces: northeast Heilongjiang and southeast Fujian province.

The Ministry of Culture and Tourism earlier warned that travel companies might have to “immediately suspend trans-provincial group tours, air tickets and hotel reservation services” if these regions can’t drop their daily cases to zero.

There have been more than 400 cases confirmed in Fujian in recent weeks. But the South China Morning Post newspaper notes today that cases have eased in the province.

However, the national Global Times newspaper says that in Heilongjiang, cases have spread beyond Harbin, the one city where the virus had been identified.

Both regions are discouraging residents against travelling and are rolling out mass testing drives to identify symptomatic and asymptomatic people.