SEOUL — Police in South Korea arrested a Chinese national Thursday who allegedly fled from quarantine officers this week after testing positive for the coronavirus upon arrival under new rules spurred by concerns over the severe outbreak in China.
The visitor, a man in his 40s, tested positive at Incheon Airport and went missing while waiting to be admitted to an isolation facility, Kim Joo-young, a health official, said at a briefing Wednesday. CCTV footage showed the man at a supermarket near the isolation hotel in Incheon, police said, according to the semiofficial Yonhap News Agency.
The traveler — who had been placed on a wanted list — faces up to one year in prison or nearly $7,900 in fines if convicted, Kim said. Authorities did not name the suspect, and it was not immediately clear if he had legal representation.
Arrivals from China are required as of this week to get a coronavirus test upon arrival in South Korea, where people must isolate for seven days if they test positive. Starting Thursday, travelers from China must also provide a negative test result when they enter the country, said Choi Seung-ho, a spokesman for the Korean Disease Control and Prevention Agency. The United States will institute a similar policy Thursday.
New restrictions have been issued by various countries in recent days after China suddenly said last week that it will begin reopening its long-closed borders Jan. 8. The announcement sent countries scrambling to prepare amid concerns that the coronavirus is running rampant in China, though Beijing has downplayed the severity of the outbreak. The United States cited China’s lack of transparency over the outbreak as one of the reasons behind its new restrictions, though independent health experts have questioned the utility of such controls.
China has criticized the measures from the United States and other countries as scientifically unfounded, warning other nations not to engage in “political manipulation” and threatening retaliatory countermeasures. China also requires negative coronavirus tests for foreign arrivals.
On Wednesday, almost 1 in 3 short-term visitors to South Korea from China — 103 out of 327 people — tested positive for the coronavirus, according to data compiled by KDCA, the health agency. (Figures were not immediately available for Korean nationals and long-term residents arriving from China.)
Those numbers are up slightly from the 26 percent of short-term travelers on flights from China to South Korea who tested positive Monday through Wednesday. Italian health authorities reported that on one flight from China to Milan on Dec. 26, half of the passengers tested positive.
Min Joo Kim in Seoul and Lily Kuo in Taipei, Taiwan, contributed to this report.