Coronavirus: Wuhan residents told to stay inside
and be vigilant
China announces day of mourning for ‘martyrs’ as city
at centre of outbreak seeks to avoid second wave before travel bans lift
Helen
Davidson
@heldavidson
Email
Fri 3 Apr
2020 04.50 BSTLast modified on Fri 3 Apr 2020 05.48 BST
Residents
of Wuhan have been warned to stay indoors and strengthen protection measures, a
few days before travel restrictions on the city at the centre of the pandemic
are scheduled to be lifted.
The city’s
top official urged vigilance as authorities sought to ward off a second wave of
infection from incoming travellers, while also easing some of its stringent
containment measures.
China has
reported more than 81,600 cases of the virus since the outbreak began,
including 3,322 deaths, but the level of transparency around the figures has
been questioned. Until this week China’s national health commission was not
including people who tested positive but showed no symptoms in its tally. On
Friday it reported 31 new confirmed cases, including two locally transmitted
infections. Four people died, all of them in Wuhan.
While the
number of daily cases has dropped dramatically since February, Wang Zhonglin,
Wuhan’s Communist party chief, said the risk of a rebound in the city’s
epidemic remained high due to both internal and external risks and it must
continue to maintain prevention and control measures.
Wuhan has
eased restrictions over recent weeks and authorities have said curbs on travel
will lift on 8 April, for those with the green “health code”.
China will
hold national mourning on Saturday for 14 “martyrs” who died while responding
to the pandemic. National and foreign embassies and consulates will fly flags
at half mast and all public entertainment will stop. At 10am there will be
three minutes’ silence.
Li Wenliang
is among the 14 health workers and police declared to be “martyrs” for their
efforts. The Chinese doctor was reprimanded by authorities for “spreading
rumours” after he sought to warn colleagues about the emergence of Covid-19 in
December, but in March an investigation into his death exonerated Li and
recommended the reprimand be withdrawn.
The
pandemic has reached new heights across the world – in particular in the US
where authorities have reported nearly 240,000 infections and 5,798 deaths,
according to the Johns Hopkins university tracker.
More than a
million people have been diagnosed with Covid-19 and more than 51,400 people
have died.
Donald
Trump has ordered defence forces to start making ventilators, after weeks of
resisting calls to broadly implement the Defence Production Act. The president
has blamed the states for a lack of medical supplies, saying they should have
stockpiled and the federal government was “a back-up, not an ordering clerk”.
New York is
said to be at risk of running out of ventilators in less than a week. The
governor, Andrew Cuomo, has been among many state leaders saying they were
desperate for assistance and complaining that states have to bid against each
other and federal agencies just to secure supplies. US authorities were
expected to release new guidelines on the wearing of masks, amid conflicting
recommendations and policies between different countries.
In other
developments around the world:
Italy
remained the country worst affected with 13,915 fatalities, followed by Spain
with 10,003 deaths. The US was the third worst affected country with 5,316
total deaths.
The World
Health Organization said Middle Eastern governments needed to act fast on
limiting the spread of the virus after cases nearly doubled in a week to almost
60,000.
Half the
world’s planes have gone into storage with international seat capacity falling
by almost 80% from a year ago. The data suggested the aviation industry may
take years to recover.
British
Airways suspended 30,000 staff and London’s Heathrow airport said it would shut
down one of its two runways from Monday. Cathay Pacific will ground most of its
fleet after a huge fall in passenger numbers.
Hong Kong
ordered pubs and bars to close for two weeks from Friday night with anyone
violating the law facing six months in jail and thousands of dollars in fines.
The Zaandam
cruise liner, on which four people died, finally docked in Fort Lauderdale
after official wrangling over whether to let it in. Dozens of those on board
were sick with flu-like symptoms.
Britain’s
National Health Service was preparing to open its first field hospital in
London on Friday and was setting up another four temporary hospitals to treat
coronavirus patients.
More than
6.65 million people filed for unemployment benefits in the US last week.
Australia’s
chief medical officer said global cases could be as high as five to 10 million.
Brendan Murphy said he was not confident of numbers coming out of the US.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário