BEIJING, (Reuters) – China ordered Wednesday that six additional U.S. airlines be suspended in the coming weeks following a spike in COVID-19-positive passengers. This brings to 70 cancellations for this year’s schedule.

The aviation regulator announced that it will suspend the flights of United Airlines from San Francisco to Shanghai starting January 24, after seven people tested positive for a virus on an earlier flight.

Four China Southern Airlines flights will be suspended from Los Angeles to Guangzhou starting the week beginning January 31st. This move would also impact return flights for February.

Three U.S. and four Chinese airlines operated about 20 flights per week between these countries before the recent cancellations. This is a far cry from the more than 100 flights that were conducted prior to the pandemic.

China also suspended flights to other countries. It suspended six flights to Canada and France on Wednesday.

The number of U.S. planes being grounded has risen since December due to Omicron infections, which are highly contagious.

Beijing and Washington disagree over airline services ever since the beginning of the pandemic. The U.S. Department of Transportation slowed down four Chinese airlines to 40% passenger capacity in August. This was four weeks after Beijing had placed similar restrictions on four United Airlines flights.

China almost closed its borders to foreign travelers. This reduced total international flights to only 200 per week (2% of the pre-pandemic level), according to China’s Civil Aviation Administration of China, September.

The country’s current zero-COVID-19 strategy has not only stopped any widespread spread from China where it was introduced two years ago but also has left it vulnerable to future economic disturbances.

Hong Kong announced last week that they would ban all incoming flights to Hong Kong from eight countries. This includes the United States and Britain.

Travellers from all over the world, even Chinese, are forced to find expensive tickets to travel home.

According to Trip.com’s search engine, almost none of the direct flights available from the United States for January were found.

Delta’s daily Seattle-Shanghai on Tuesdays sold for approximately 40,000 yuan (or $6,285).

“Now, going back to China seems impossible.” “More and more flights are being cancelled,” a frustrated Chinese user of the social media platform Weibo, (NASDAQ:), posted Tuesday.

“Piss off, Omicron. “I have not been home in two years.”

($1=6.3647 renminbi)