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Qatar to require all travelers from China to have a COVID test
The testing requirement is imposed on all travelers regardless of vaccination status, the agency added.
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Qatar Airways Airbus A380. Qatar Airways flights from Doha to the U.S. will now follow a strict no-gadgets rule. The only exception? Your phone. (shutterstock.com/Dmitry Birin /File)
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atar will from Tuesday require travelers arriving from China to provide a negative COVID-19 test result taken within 48 hours of departure, Qatar's state news agency QNA said on Monday.
The testing requirement is imposed on all travelers regardless of vaccination status, the agency added.
Last month, Beijing abruptly began dismantling its "zero-Covid" containment policy of lockdowns and mass testing, three years after the coronavirus first emerged in the city of Wuhan.
As Covid overwhelms Chinese hospitals and crematoriums, officials have insisted that the wave is "under control" despite acknowledging that the true scale of infections is "impossible" to track.
Australia's health minister on Sunday cited Beijing's "lack of comprehensive information" about Covid cases as the reasoning behind the travel requirement, which will take effect on January 5. The move will "safeguard Australia from the risk of potential new emerging variants," he said.
In recent days, Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Spain, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan have also imposed either a negative Covid test requirement or testing upon arrival for travellers from China.
Canada cited "the limited epidemiological and viral genomic sequence data available" on recent Covid cases in China for its negative test demand.
Meanwhile, Morocco moved to ban all arrivals from China on Saturday, "to avoid a new wave of contaminations in Morocco and all its consequences".
