In the last few hours the U.K. FCO changed it’s travel advice to “....
advise against all but essential travel to the rest of mainland China (not including Hong Kong and Macao)”. Given that advice and also given the company has a duty of care to it’s crew members operating flights to/from China and as a consequence laying over in either Beijing or Shanghai I’d say it’s a reasonable decision.
https://www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/china