Phil C. W. Chan

Opinion | Why shunning South Africa based on Covid-19 Omicron variant fears is counterproductive

South Africa acted as a good global citizen in promptly reporting the new variant. In response, various countries have imposed a ban on flights from South Africa and its neighbours

This sends a message to other states where variants could emerge that it might not be in their national interest to be transparent

Reading Time:3 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

A woman wearing a face mask holds a child on her back on a crowded street in Pretoria, South Africa, on November 27. Photo: AP

Phil C. W. Chan

Published: 3:30am, 1 Dec 2021Updated: 4:26am, 1 Dec 2021

For someone who is not a professional journalist, I seem frequently to be blessed with opportunities to look at societies through “fieldwork research” beyond my original intentions. I walked into the lion’s den again as I began a three-month visit to South Africa on November 24.

Little did I know South Africa had identified the newest coronavirus variant that has a large number of mutations and has shown, based on preliminary evidence, an increased risk of reinfection, and that as a responsible state it reported the discovery to the World Health Organization on the same day I departed for Cape Town.

Having learned from its delay in declaring a pandemic after the coronavirus first emerged in Wuhan in January 2020, the WHO on November 26 designated the new variant as one “of concern” and named it Omicron.

Instead of thanking South Africa for its integrity in promptly identifying and sharing information about the variant, a multitude of states (and Hong Kong) swiftly announced travel bans on flights and travellers from South Africa and neighbouring countries.

Chaos inevitably followed at Johannesburg and Cape Town international airports, where long queues of travellers clung to hopes they might get a seat on the last flights out of the country despite eye-watering fares on convoluted routes.

02:24

UK bans travel from South Africa after emergence of new heavily-mutated Covid-19 variant

Angelique Coetzee, the South African doctor who first raised the alarm over a potential new variant among her patients, and chairperson of the South African Medical Association, has reported that symptoms of the variant were “unusual but mild”, consisting essentially of lethargy.