CORONAVIRUS DEATH TOLL RISES TO 813
More than 37,000 people confirmed as being infected with virus that has spread to over 25 countries
Beijing, Feb. 9: The death toll in China’s coronavirus outbreak jumped to 813 on Sunday, surpassing global fatalities in the 2002-03 SARS epidemic, even as Chinese officials said the cases of deadly infection have started declining for the first time after weeks of sharp rise.
Ninety one more people died, mostly in Hubei died. China’s National Health Commission said 2,656 new confirmed cases were reported, taking the total number of people infected to 37,287.
● Over 70 exhibitors, including US aerospace giant Lockheed Martin and 12 Chinese companies, have pulled out of Asia’s biggest aviation and defence event Singapore Airshow amid mounting concerns over the novel coronavirus outbreak.
● The companies that have pulled out represent about 8 per cent of participants.
● Over 930 companies will be exhibiting and 45,000 trade attendees are still expected.
Beijing, Feb. 9: The toll in China’s coronavirus outbreak rose to 811 on Sunday, surpassing the number of fatalities in the 200203 SARS epidemic, while over 37,000 people have been confirmed as being infected with the deadly virus that has spread to more than 25 countries. Eighty-nine deaths were reported on Saturday — the highest single-day toll — and there were 2,656 new confirmed cases of the deadly infection, China’s National Health Commission said in its daily report on Sunday.
A total of 811 people have died of the disease so far and 37,198 confirmed cases have been reported in 31 provincial-level regions in China, according to the commission. The toll surpassed the number of fatalities in the 2002-2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or SARS epidemic that started in southern China and killed more than 700 people in the mainland, Hong Kong and elsewhere. Among the 89 deaths, 81 were from Hubei province, the epicentre of the virus outbreak, two in Henan, and one each in Hebei, Heilongjiang, Anhui, Shandong, Hunan and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, it said.
On Saturday, 600 people, including 324 in Hubei province, recovered and walked out of the hospitals, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. As per the data released by the commission, confirmed cases in Hubei, the ground zero of the epidemic, showed a drop perhaps for the first time since the virulent virus first emerged in the province in December.
By Saturday, 26 cases and a death were reported in Hong Kong, 10 cases in Macao and 17 in Taiwan. A patient each in Macao and Taiwan were discharged from hospital.
UN team for China WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that the UN health agency will send an international mission to China as it received a response from Beijing.