China slashes quarantine period for new arrivals

China on Tuesday cut its quarantine period in half for new arrivals, health authorities said, in the first step toward easing its COVID-19 border restrictions.

Under the new guidelines, those arriving in China from abroad will spend seven days at a government-run quarantine facility and another three days in home isolation.

Previously, people arriving from abroad had to spend 14 days in quarantine, followed by another seven days in home or hotel isolation.

It was the ninth amendment to China's "Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia Prevention and Control Plan" made public on Tuesday afternoon by the country's National Health Commission (NHC).

The country follows a strict "zero-COVID" policy to avoid the spread of the deadly coronavirus.

China has so far reported 225,581 confirmed coronavirus cases, including 5,226 deaths, since the first cases were detected in Wuhan city in the country's central Hubei province in December 2019.