Inside China's Swine Flu Quarantine System
BEIJING—China has perhaps the strictest quarantine procedures in the world to limit the spread of the Influenza A H1N1 virus—as I found out firsthand today.
I’m the Asia editor for Science. My family and I have lived in Beijing for nearly 2 years. Earlier today, we arrived on a flight to Beijing’s capital airport from London, via Amsterdam. I had taken part in the World Conference of Science Journalists last week in London and my family and I had visited relatives in the United Kingdom.
In response to the pandemic, a medical team boards every international flight arriving in China and scans each passenger with an infrared thermometer. We disembarked, assuming everything was okay. But at a counter where passengers turn in medical declarations, we were pulled to the side and told that our younger son, Quinn, who is 6, had a slight fever and would be tested for the virus—a process that would take "1 hour or three."