EU offers help to counter China's Covid crisis including vaccine donation

The European Union said Tuesday it has offered China help to deal with its COVID-19 crisis, including the donation of vaccines, as the bloc seeks to coordinate how authorities should check incoming passengers from China for any new variants.

Several member nations announced individual efforts over the past week. At the same time, the EU's European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control insisted that the situation in China didn't pose an immediate overall threat to health.

The variants circulating in China are already circulating in the EU, and as such are not challenging for the immune response of EU citizens, it said in its latest impact study published Tuesday.

Yet fearful not to be caught unawares like at the outset of the global pandemic in early 2020, medical experts from EU member states were already preparing potential action to be taken up by an Integrated Political Crisis Response meeting on Wednesday, where measure like EU-wide entry requirements could be ...