Landing in China during the coronavirus pandemic looks like dystopia. As the rest of the world begins to reopen its borders to non-essential travel, Chinese airports hint at how worried the government remains about Covid-19: employees in protective suits, rope-controlled international passenger flow and careful procedure which records each traveler’s cell phone. That’s how I discovered a case of the disease on my flight.
I left Guarulhos on the 6th of November towards Shanghai, but the trip to China starts long before getting on the plane. Virtually closed since the beginning of 2020, the country has developed a complex pandemic monitoring system, essential to contain the disease in the health bubble created by Beijing.
Before leaving Brazil, it is necessary to send on a government platform the results not only of a PCR test, as is customary for several international trips, but also of an IgM antibody test. Immunoglobulin is the first response of the immune system after exposure to coronavirus and can take months to disappear from the body. In practice, the requirement made me isolate myself weeks before the actual trip, as an infection, even if it was cured, would prevent me from boarding.
Only direct or one-stop flights are allowed. And, at the stop, one more requirement: the PCR and IgM exams have to be redone, and a new authorization to continue the trip, requested. Few airports in the world have testing centers associated with the local Chinese consulate, and the price of the tests easily exceeds the order of thousands of reais (stop in Zurich, as was my case, the exams cost 340 francs, just over R$2300 with the IOF). Given the requirements, there are few available seats, and the airlines that have flights to the country sell tickets with the weight of gold (for me, something around US$ 8,000, around R$ 44,000).
Once boarding is authorized, each passenger receives two QR codes: customs and health. The squares are scanned dozens of times, and the government’s immigration system records who and where each traveler was seated. Upon exiting the plane, everyone is taken to a new round of PCR tests (collected with material from the nose and throat). Once the procedure is completed, passengers are taken to buses in groups of 25 people and randomly sent to quarantine hotels, paid with their own resources and from which they will not be able to leave for at least 14 days.
Two days after arriving in China, I was still suffering from jet lag and dozing off when an employee at the hotel I was sent to called my room. “Sir, they found cases of Covid on his flight to Shanghai. Check your health code and prepare for the PCR tomorrow morning.” The traveler registration system confirmed this: someone seated within three rows of my seat was diagnosed with Covid on the very first day of quarantine, and therefore everyone would be under closer surveillance.
“What happens now?” I asked the clerk. He replied saying that it was necessary to “wait and see”. Colleagues who went through the same situation said that everyone would be tested and, if there was confirmation of any case, the infected would be taken to isolation in a hospital and would stay there for at least 21 days. All other passengers would be monitored, and the quarantine count would start from zero if anyone sitting next to you or immediately in front of you on both the plane and the bus heading to the hotel also received a positive result.
The next morning, two doctors covered head to toe in protective clothing knocked on my door. In addition to taking the test, I was instructed to sign a term in Chinese that attested to having been informed of the Covid case next to me and in which I agreed with my new routine: temperature checks every day after breakfast and after breakfast. lunch and a call at the end of the day to check on my health.
I would still be retested on the tenth and thirteenth day of quarantine, and only then would I be released to do a less restrictive third week of quarantine at another hotel. For this period, a new health code is required, this time issued by the city hall and linked to a local telephone number. The app tracks the location of all users 24 hours a day and may turn yellow or red if there is close contact with another Covid case in the meantime.
My exam was negative. When I commented to the doctor who checked my temperature daily about the accuracy of the system, she replied, “We can’t pass up any cases.”
Covid Zero
Strict contact tracing and the enormous bureaucracy for the few foreigners allowed to enter the country put the Chinese in a separate category in the fight against Covid. While it protested when then-US President Donald Trump decided to ban flights from China in the first few months since the outbreak in Wuhan, Beijing followed the global trend in the wake and closed its borders indefinitely. Almost two years later, nothing indicates willingness to reverse the decision in the near future.
In September, the southern metropolis of Guangzhou opened a huge quarantine center for international travelers. At a cost of R$ 1.4 billion, the structure occupies an area of 250 thousand square meters, has the capacity to receive up to 5,074 travelers and has an advanced artificial intelligence system capable of constantly measuring the temperature of the quarantines, in addition to robots for the delivery of food and monitors for telemedicine. An investment that is only justified if planned to be lasting.
The concern is more than just sanitary. When it managed to control the outbreak of the disease in Wuhan, China soon saw Covid cases soar around the world. Closed, it used its success in fighting the pandemic to bolster the government’s credibility as state media depicted apocalyptic scenes in hospitals in Brazil, India and the US. The result in collective morals was immediate, and the population refuses to live with the virus.
Reversing the effects of official propaganda is no simple task, and the government is in no hurry. On the radar, the most immediate concerns are securing the Winter Olympics in February and ensuring that Xi Jinping takes on a third five-year term in November 2022 with no domestic crises to deal with at the same time.
This does not mean that the Communist Party is not aware of the need to reopen the country. In August, epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan, one of the government’s top advisers in the response to Covid and famous for helping to combat the SARS crisis in 2003, highlighted the conditions necessary for Beijing to consider making the entry of foreigners more flexible. In a rare public statement, he said the government will only consider reopening when the country reaches 85% of the population fully vaccinated, “immunization advances internationally and transmission abroad reaches relatively low levels.”
homesickness
While flexibility does not occur, Brazilians living in China live with anxiety, concern and homesickness. This is the case of tour guide Dani Tassy. In China since 2014, she was traveling with a group of Brazilians when the Sars-Cov-2 outbreak broke out in Wuhan. Tassy was hopeful that the situation would return to normal in a few months and, unlike other foreign friends, decided not to leave.
The impact of the decision was emotional and financial, as the number of customers plummeted after the restrictions began. She claims to expect an improvement in sanitary conditions so that the borders reopen as soon as possible, but is already thinking of a deadline.
“Leaving China for those who live here is risky because we don’t know when or if we’ll be able to return. I went through moments of great anxiety, of wondering if it was worth staying. My brother got married in the meantime, and I lost a cousin to Covid in Brazil. I think that if things don’t change a year from now, I’m going to take a risk and come back”, says she, who since January 2019 has not seen her mother, who lives in the interior of São Paulo.
If for those who are already in the country, the decision to stay becomes more and more costly, those who need to enter are also weighing up pros and cons. Environmental analyst Pedro Campany, who arrived in China with his wife and 11-year-old son in March to work, says he had to think hard before accepting the job.
“It was a family project, and in the end we chose what would be best not only for us, but for our son. But the distance complicates it. My mother always asks me if I’m going to stay here once and when I’m going to visit Brazil. Last week the family got together for a wedding, they made a video call and it was difficult. Is not the same thing.”
And back to my quarantine room
Negative test, I can breathe a sigh of relief for now. The first phase of my quarantine ends next Monday (22), but the process is far from over. From here, I go to a new hotel, where I will be “observation” for another seven days. Although you can circulate in Shanghai, the recommendation is to do the strictly essential during this period.
After two more Covid tests, I can then sail to Beijing, where another week of observation awaits me. Extreme, perhaps even exaggerated caution proves: when it comes to the pandemic, China is unwilling to pay to see it.
regular updates
In an effort to bring Brazilian readers analysis and information about the latest happenings on the other side of the world, the blog “China, Terra do Meio” is regularly updated. In addition to the texts here, you can also subscribe to our newsletter, sent every Friday.
