Australia defends ‘moderate’ Covid testing mandate for China arrivals: ‘to travel to China you need to do it as well’

Pre-departure testing was a reasonable condition to impose on travellers from China, Australian Health Minister Mark Butler told reporters

The ‘temporary’ measure was put in place due to a lack of information about the spread of Covid in China and was not a barrier to travel, he said

Reading Time:2 minutes

People travelling from China wait for their baggage at an airport in France. Australia’s health minister pointed out that several European states, as well as the US and Japan, also require travellers from China to provide a negative pre-departure Covid test. Photo: EPA-EFE

Published: 6:01pm, 5 Jan 2023Updated: 8:08pm, 5 Jan 2023

Australia’s health minister on Thursday defended his country’s “modest” pre-departure testing measures on travellers from China, saying they were designed to nudge Beijing into sharing more Covid data.

Health Minister Mark Butler ignored the advice of Australia’s chief medical officer to introduce the new restrictions, which he said would not hinder travel between Australia and China.

“We want these measures to be temporary, they are modest measures, and as you see with flights arriving today, they are not a barrier to travel,” he told reporters in Melbourne.

From Thursday, people arriving in Australia from mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau are required to produce a negative PCR test that was taken within 48 hours of their departure. Visitors who use a rapid antigen test to prove they don’t have Covid need to have the procedure overseen by a medical worker.

Butler said that preflight testing was a reasonable condition to impose on travellers as there was “very little information on the ground” about the spread of Covid in China. The World Health Organization has said China is “under-representing” the severity of its current outbreak.