Inbound travelers wait for hours to board buses to leave for quarantine hotels and facilities from Guangzhou Baiyun Airport in southern China's Guangdong province on December 25 2022. China will drop a COVID-19 quarantine requirement for passengers arriving from abroad starting Jan. 8, the National Health Commission announced Monday, Dec, 26, 2022 in the latest easing of the country's once-strict virus-control measures. (Photo by Emily Wang Fujiyama/AP Photo)





The first Fuxing high-speed train runs along the new Chengdu-Kunming High-speed Railway on December 26, 2022 in Leshan, Sichuan Province of China. With a length of 915 km and a designed speed of 160 km per hour, a new high-speed railway linking Chengdu and Kunming fully opened on Monday, cutting the travel time from 19 hours to 7.5 hours. (Photo by VCG/VCG via Getty Images)





A vendor wears a mask as he waits for customers at a popup store in Beijing, Tuesday, December 27, 2022. Companies welcomed China's decision to end quarantines for travelers from abroad as an important step to revive slumping business activity while Japan on Tuesday announced restrictions on visitors from the country as infections surge. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





Visitors to a shopping mall jump ropes as they enjoy the mild weather in Beijing, Tuesday, December 27, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





This aerial photo taken on December 28, 2022 shows a multi-vehicle collision on Zhengxin Yellow River Bridge in Zhengzhou, in China's central Henan province. (Photo by AFP Photo/China Stringer Network)





Folk performers take part in the opening ceremony of the annual Chagan Lake Winter Fishing Festival in Songyuan, in northeast China's Jilin province on December 28, 2022. (Photo by Jade Gao/AFP Photo)





A fisherman cracks a whip as horses wheel a device linked to a fishing net during the annual Chagan Lake Winter Fishing Festival in Songyuan, in northeastern China's Jilin province on December 28, 2022. (Photo by Jade Gao/AFP Photo)





A police autonomous robot patrols a mall area in Beijing, Wednesday, December 28, 2022. China says it will resume issuing passports for tourism in another big step away from anti-virus controls that isolated the country for almost three years, setting up a potential flood of Chinese going abroad for next month's Lunar New Year holiday. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





Residents pose for selfies outside a popular bakery in Beijing, Wednesday, December 28, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





A resident takes a selfie as he skates on a frozen canal near sunset in Beijing, Wednesday, December 28, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





A woman wearing a mask walks along a mall in Beijing, Wednesday, December 28, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





Residents wearing masks play mahjong outdoor during a sunny day in Beijing, Tuesday, December 27, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





Shoppers return to the Xidan shopping district in Beijing, Thursday, December 29, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





Residents burn paper money for the deceased on the street in Beijing, Wednesday, December 28, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





Liao Xiaofeng, 47, sits by an oxygen concentrator and her mother Chen Lifen, 86, upon returning from a clinic, at their home in a village of Lezhi county after strict measures to curb the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) were removed nationwide, in Ziyang, Sichuan province, China on December 29, 2022. (Photo by Tingshu Wang/Reuters)





Shoppers walk along a mall district in Beijing, Thursday, December 29, 2022. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





A shopper stands with her purchase near decorations outside a mall in Beijing, Thursday, December 29, 2022. China is on a bumpy road back to normal life as schools, shopping malls and restaurants fill up again following the abrupt end of some of the world's most severe restrictions even as hospitals are swamped with feverish, wheezing COVID-19 patients. (Photo by Ng Han Guan/AP Photo)





A traveller wearing a face mask with his luggage and passport walks by a poster depicting the Beijing airport on display at the international flight check in counter at the Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing, Thursday, December 29, 2022. Moves by the U.S., Japan and others to mandate COVID-19 tests for passengers arriving from China reflect global concern that new variants could emerge in its ongoing explosive outbreak – and the government may not inform the rest of the world quickly enough. (Photo by Andy Wong/AP Photo)





A Long March 3B carrier rocket carrying the Shiyan-10 02 satellite blasts off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center on December 29, 2022 in Xichang, Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province of China. (Photo by Li Jieyi/VCG via Getty Images)





Panda keepers hold cubs while posing for photos ahead of the new year at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in Chengdu, China's southwestern Sichuan province on December 29, 2022. (Photo by AFP Photo/China Stringer Network)