France latest to impose Covid-19 tests amid China variant fears

France has urged other European Union countries to follow suit as it became the latest to impose mandatory Covid-19 tests for airline passengers arriving from China, amid concern over the potential emergence of new variants.

The decision follows similar moves by Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Japan, India, Qatar and the United States, after China abruptly dropped strict control measures, allowing the virus to surge through its population of 1.4 billion people.

Passengers arriving from China will be subject to random screening on arrival in France, something minister for health François Braun said would allow health authorities to “follow the different variants extremely precisely”.

French rules

Mr Braun told French media it was essential to avoid a new variant of Covid-19 emerging from China as he reviewed the new testing procedures now in place at the Paris Charles de Gaulle airport

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“France will push for this methodology to be applied across the EU,” he said.

The French rules oblige passengers on flights from China to wear masks on board and to present proof on-boarding of having tested negative for the virus less than 48 hours before takeoff. Passengers found to be positive on arrival will be obliged to isolate.

Italy last week announced it would test all arriving passengers from China and undertake genetic sequencing of any positive tests, in order to “ensure the surveillance and identification of any variants of the virus, in order to protect the Italian population”.

China has been reporting about one death a day and has stopped publishing infection figures, leading to suspicions that Beijing is simply not reporting a death rate that analysts expect to reach thousands daily, based on the mortality record of the disease.

The US’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said its decision to mandate negative tests for passengers arriving from China was due to the “lack of adequate and transparent epidemiological and viral genomic sequence data” being released by Beijing.

Genetic sequencing

Reduced testing and reporting of data “could delay the identification of new variants of concern if they arise”, the CDC warned.

The World Health Organisation urged China to share real-time information about the number of infections and hospitalisations, virus genetic sequencing data, and deaths, when officials met to discuss the situation on Friday.

“WHO again asked for regular sharing of specific and real-time data on the epidemiological situation,” the international health body said in a statement, saying its officials had stressed the “importance of vaccination and boosters to protect against severe disease and death for people at higher risk”.

EU member states held an emergency meeting of its health and security committee late last week, which rejected a call by Italy for all countries to test all airline passenger arrivals from China.

A statement following the meeting declared that it was “crucial” for national responses to cross-border health threats to be coordinated.

The European Commission said it would “remain vigilant”, and that if necessary its “emergency brake” restricting inbound travel from a high-risk country could be activated.