Former Australia-China Council chairman Warwick Smith has endorsed the move to test Chinese travellers for COVID-19.
A leading business figure has endorsed COVID-19 testing requirements for Chinese travellers, even as the Opposition Leader denounced the government for disregarding advice from the chief medical officer.
“The momentum of developing renewed business links to recover from a bad period ... will not be stalled by doing what we should do in the health sense,” he said.Mr Smith noted Australia was not alone in imposing travel restrictions and that China itself had stringent requirements for incoming travellers before abandoning its nearly three-year COVID-zero approach. The US, UK, Canada, Italy, India and South Korea have all required the same test from incoming Chinese travellers.
“The most relevant health advice for Australians is our Chief Medical Officer’s advice, as it considers all factors in the context of our nation’s health and economic position,” the opposition said. “But we’ve been pretty clear that we take decisions that we think are in the best interest of the country, again, out of an abundance of caution, again, consistent with what a lot of other countries are doing.”He said Australia was not considering bringing in similar restrictions against the US, where the XBB 1.5 variant is driving a winter wave of cases.
“There is strong consensus that implementation of any restrictions to travel from China at this time would be inconsistent with the current national approach to the management of COVID-19 and disproportionate to the risk.”Australia China Business Council president David Olsson was optimistic the restrictions would be temporary, and that the government would use the next few weeks to “come to a more definitive view which would allow us to get back to a more normal footing”.
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