A health care worker reminds people waiting in line for COVID-19 testing at the Lincoln Heights Recreation Center testing site in Los Angeles, California, the United States, Jan. 2, 2022.(Photo: Xinhua)

The Chinese Embassy in the US urged travelers flying to China to strictly follow anti-epidemic rules such as a mandatory self-health monitoring for seven days ahead of a flight and strict self-quarantine for 48 hours before the flight to prevent them from getting infected. 

On Saturday, the Chinese Embassy posted a notice on its website reminding would-be travelers going to China to carefully assess the urgency and necessity of international travel amid the epidemic, especially the possible economic losses caused by frequent flight "circuit-breaker" in recent days, and to remember "not to travel unless necessary."

At the same time, the embassy reminds passengers with urgent travel need to strictly follow the requirements issued by the Chinese Embassy and Consulate Generals in the US for testing. Passengers need to take health monitoring process seven days ahead of the flight after taking relevant tests in the location where they board the flight. They also need to strictly self-quarantine rules for 48 hours before the flight takes off in order to prevent contacts with the outside world. 

Currently, the Omicron variant continues to ravage the US, where average daily infection is nearly 800,000 with more than 1,700 deaths in total, according to the data from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention of the US.

Meanwhile, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases imported from the US to China has risen sharply, and people who go out for sightseeing, shopping, or attending dinner parties after completing pre-travel tests are the main causes of infection, the Chinese Embassy in the US said in the statement.

The notice came after media reported that as many as 70 flights from the US to China have been canceled since the beginning of 2022 amid a growing number of COVID-19 cases in the US. 

According to Reuters, the number of flights between China and the US has dropped from about 100 per week before the pandemic to about 20 now. The Biden administration on January 12 criticized China's decision to cancel a growing number of flights and warned it could take countermeasures.

"It is necessary for China to strengthen control in response to the global pandemic fueled by the Omicron variant, and the massive cancellations of flights between China and the US should be blamed on the US' inadequate epidemic prevention," a Chinese civil aviation worker said.

Experts also pointed out that Washington is trying to intensify its criticism of China's epidemic prevention policies on such a pretext, especially ahead of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. But China will continue to make its own epidemic prevention measures according to how things change, experts emphasized.

The Chinese Embassy has noticed that some "walkthroughs" have been found on social media platforms including Sina Weibo and WeChat to circumvent epidemic prevention requirements of self-health monitoring.

The Chinese Embassy stressed that it will verify through various channels whether passengers travelling to China strictly abide by relevant regulations, and a number of passengers have already been denied a "green code" for dishonest behavior, and some have even been held legally responsible.