Specialists call for nation's medical system to be safeguarded

After three years of battling COVID-19, experts said China is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel as it continues to optimize measures against the epidemic.

On Wednesday, the National Health Commission unveiled 10 changes to the country's COVID-19 restrictions. The move came less than a month after China introduced its first set of 20 optimization rules to deal with the highly transmissible, but less virulent, Omicron subvariants.

The latest rules include removing the need for negative results of PCR tests and health codes for cross-regional travel and to enter public spaces, with the exceptions of nursing homes, hospitals, kindergartens and other places where there is a concentration of vulnerable people.

People with mild symptoms and asymptomatic cases can now elect to quarantine at home instead of at centralized quarantine facilities. Meanwhile, the purchase of over-the-counter treatments for fever, coughs and colds, as well as antiviral drugs, is no longer restricted.

Speaking at a media briefing on Wednesday, Wang Hesheng, deputy director of the NHC, said that over the past three years, China has stamped out more than 100 flare-ups and has successfully mitigated five waves of COVID-19, while having one of the lowest levels of infections and COVID-related deaths in the world.

In the meantime, China has issued nine editions of epidemic prevention, control and treatment guidelines, as well as two sets of optimization rules, Wang added. "We have effectively tackled the uncertainties presented by the epidemic with strategic stability and flexible measures," he said.

China now has effective diagnostic methods, contact tracing and treatments, and over 90 percent of the population has been vaccinated. These conditions have protected lives and created an environment conducive to socioeconomic growth, Wang said.

However, some foreign reports said that China's epidemic strategy was slow to react to Omicron, and its triumph over the epidemic is a Pyrrhic victory that has come at great socioeconomic cost. The facts show those claims to be untrue, experts said.