Doctors in China have adopted a new way of diagnosing the novel coronavirus, leading to a huge jump in both the official number of deaths blamed on the disease and the tally of confirmed cases in the country at the heart of the outbreak. Officials in Hubei province, the Chinese region where the virus is believed to have jumped into the human population from wild animals, reported 254 new deaths and 15,152 new cases of the flu-like virus. The increase brought the worldwide death toll to at least 1,369 and the number of confirmed cases to more than 60,000. Only about 400 of those patients, and just two of the confirmed fatalities, have been outside of mainland China.The sharp increase came after two days of reported declines in the number of confirmed new cases in China. It was the result of Chinese doctors in Hubei province starting to use lung imaging to diagnose the disease, in addition to the standard nucleic acid tests they had been using. The largest cluster of coronavirus cases outside of China, on a cruise ship that has been quarantined for almost two weeks in Japan, continued to grow Thursday. With 218 cases confirmed from the Diamond Princess, Japan’s government said it would allow some elderly passengers from the vessel to move into government-provided housing on land, where they would be monitored for symptoms apart from the general population.
British grime music star Stormzy announced Thursday that he would reschedule the Asia leg of his current world tour due to the deadly coronavirus epidemic. The rapper, real name Michael Omari, told his social media followers he had “regrettably” decided to postpone his shows on the continent starting next month due to the outbreak.
The 26-year-old had been set to perform in Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, China, South Korea and Indonesia in March and April, as part of his “Heavy is the Head” tour. “I was seriously looking forward to bringing the #HITH world tour to Asia and playing some epic sold out shows,” Stormzy wrote on Instagram. “But due to the ongoing health and travel concerns surrounding the Coronavirus, I’m regrettably having to reschedule this leg. “Information regarding the rescheduled dates will follow in due course… I promise I’ll be back,” he added.
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group’s CEO Daniel Zhang characterized the widening coronavirus crisis as a “black swan event” on Thursday, warning that the outbreak has potentially global implications. During a call with analysts discussing the company’s fiscal third-quarter results that beat expectations, Zhang said that the coronavirus presents “near term” challenges to Alibaba’s businesses that will have “significant impact” on China and beyond. As the numbers of those affected continue to rise, economists and businesses have made sobering remarks about the outlook for worldwide growth. On Thursday, Alibaba reported its revenue rose 38% year-over-year during a strong quarter. In the release, Zhang touted the “robust growth” across the lines of business, pointing to a record Single’s Day, increased user engagement, and rapid growth in the cloud computing services. However, the coronavirus remained at the forefront of the company’s remarks to investors. The crisis has roiled markets with the estimated death toll reaching 1,350 and the number of confirmed cases topping 60,000 — most of them in mainland China. “In response to the coronavirus, we mobilized Alibaba ecosystem’s powerful forces of commerce and technology to fully support the fight against the outbreak, ensure supply of daily necessities for our communities and introduced practical relief measures for our merchants,” Zhang said. With a growing number of multinationals curtailing or shuttering Chinese operations and evacuating employees, Zhang said the company “took every effort to protect the health and safety of employees through flexible work policy and remote office collaboration.”
He added: “No matter past, present or future, we remain true to our mission and we will support our merchants to overcome this challenging time together,” he added.
Shortly after the outbreak, Alibaba began procuring medical supplies from around the world. To date, over 40 million units have been donated to Wuhan and other affected cities, Zhang said.
Zhang emphasized that they are “monitoring the challenge and identifying opportunity as the situation evolves.”
He observed that there’s been a delay in employees returning to work after the Chinese New Year, which is preventing merchants and logistics companies from assuming operations. According to Zhang, this is having a “negative impact” on commerce as merchants’ operations haven’t returned to normal. What’s more, a “significant number of packages are not able to be delivered on time.”
Strong growth amidst a pandemic
Both Alibaba and JD.com have seen a surge in online ordering since the virus forced China to mandate quarantines, keeping many citizens homebound.
The company’s Freshippo supermarket is seeing online order increase “significantly” as a “result of consumer migration to online purchasing” of fresh goods, groceries, and daily necessities, according to Alibaba. However, Zhang added that there are limitations in the delivery capacity that is preventing order volume from fully recovering.
While categories like grocery have increased, restaurant visits and delivery orders have declined because many restaurants haven’t resumed normal operations, Zhang added.
Travel booking also saw “material” numbers of cancellations because of the virus, he said.
Alibaba’s leadership emphasized that they’re committed to supporting their merchants by providing interest-free or low-interest loans through Ant Financial to help normalize merchants’ operations.
CFO Maggie Wu said it’s “too early to quantify the impact” coronavirus will have on the business.
She added that it’s impacting the overall economy in China, especially the retail and services sectors. While the demand for goods and services is there, the “means of production has been tempered” by the delay in openings after the Lunar New Year holiday.
Wu added that Alibaba is “not immune to this imbalance of supply and demand,” but the company sees “an opportunity to provide value and support.” According to Wu, this will help “translate into sustainable, long-term growth,” which is similar to what they saw after the 2003 SARS outbreak.
She said they “remain optimistic about consumption growth” and “remain confident about the long-term.” Wu emphasized that this is a “one-off occurrence” and by “helping customers through difficult times” that will “help drive” sustainable long-term growth.
The GSMA, the organization behind the world’s largest mobile trade show, has announced that it is officially canceling the show. MWC usually attracts over 100,000 attendees from 200 countries to Barcelona. This year’s show was supposed to take place on February 24-27. Several publications received a statement about the cancellation. “The GSMA has cancelled MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern regarding the coronavirus outbreak, travel concern and other circumstances, make it impossible for the GSMA to hold the event,” GSMA CEO John Hoffman told Bloomberg and the Financial Times. El Diario, El País and La Vanguardia also report that the show has been canceled. The GSMA has now published a statement confirming its decision to cancel — writing:
Since the first edition of Mobile World Congress in Barcelona in 2006, the GSMA has convened the industry, governments, ministers, policymakers, operators and industry leaders across the broader ecosystem.
With due regard to the safe and healthy environment in Barcelona and the host country today, the GSMA has cancelled MWC Barcelona 2020 because the global concern regarding the coronavirus outbreak, travel concern and other circumstances, make it impossible for the GSMA to hold the event.
The Host City Parties respect and understand this decision.
The GSMA and the Host City Parties will continue to be working in unison and supporting each other for MWC Barcelona 2021 and future editions.
Our sympathies at this time are with those affected in China, and all around the world.
Further updates from the GSMA, are on our website and can be found on www.mwcbarcelona.com.
Dozens of companies pulled out of the trade show. In other words, some of the top consumer electronics and telecom companies got scared. And those who thought that GSMA had things under control started to cancel their attendance as well — it wasn’t worth going to Barcelona if many important partners had already canceled. Some of the companies that announced they wouldn’t be attending include Amazon, Deutsche Telekom, Ericsson, Facebook, HMD, Intel, LG, Nokia, NTT Docomo, Sony and Sprint. GSMA’s lawyers wanted to make sure that the association wouldn’t be held accountable if there was a single case of coronavirus at the show. But they started another virus — companies pulling out one by one.
SINGAPORE (Reuters) – The coronavirus epidemic may be peaking in China where it was first detected in the central city of Wuhan but it is just beginning in the rest of the world and likely to spread, a global expert on infectious diseases said on Wednesday. The Chinese government’s senior medical adviser has said the disease is hitting a peak in China and may be over by April. He said he was basing the forecast on mathematical modelling, recent events and government action. Dale Fisher, chair of the Global Outbreak Alert & Response Network that is coordinated by the World Health Organization, said that predicted “time course” may well be true if the virus is allowed to run free in Wuhan. “It’s fair to say that’s really what we are seeing,” he told Reuters in an interview. “But it has spread to other places where it’s the beginning of the outbreak. In Singapore, we are at the beginning of the outbreak.” The flu-like virus has killed more than 1,100 people and infected nearly 45,000, predominantly in China and mostly in Wuhan. Singapore has reported 50 coronavirus cases, one of the highest tallies outside China, including mounting evidence of local transmission.
“I’d be pretty confident though that eventually every country will have a case,” Fisher said.
Asked why there were so many cases in Singapore, he said there were comparatively more tests being conducted on the island. “We have a very low index of suspicion for testing people so…we do have higher ascertainment,” he said, but added that there was a lot about transmission of the virus yet to be understood. Kenneth Mak, director of medical services at Singapore’s health ministry, told a news conference it was difficult to be confident in projections that the epidemic will peak in China this month but, in any case, peaks in other countries will lag China by one or two months. Fisher said there was no justification for the kind of panic buying of essentials like rice and toilet rolls seen in Singapore. “There’s no suggestion we are going to run out of anything,” he said. “I would just stay level-headed.”
He said the elderly and those with diabetes were most at risk of serious illness.
“For the vast majority of people it will just be a mild illness but still treat it with respect,” Fisher said.
BEIJING/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – China reported on Wednesday its smallest number of new coronavirus cases since January, lending weight to a prediction by its top medical adviser for the outbreak to end by April, but a global diseases expert warned of the spread elsewhere.
Financial markets took heart from the outlook of the Chinese official, epidemiologist Zhong Nanshan, who said on Tuesday the number of new cases was falling in some provinces, and forecast the epidemic would peak this month, even as the death toll in China rose to more than 1,100 people.
World stocks, which had seen rounds of sell-offs over the virus, surged to record highs on hopes of a peak in cases. The Dow industrials, S&P 500 and Nasdaq all hit new highs, and Asian shares nudged higher on Wednesday But the World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that the epidemic poses a global threat akin to terrorism and one expert coordinating its response said while the outbreak may be peaking at its epicentre in China, it was likely to spread elsewhere in the world, where it had just begun. “It has spread to other places where it’s the beginning of the outbreak,” the official, Dale Fisher, head of the Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network coordinated by the WHO, said in an interview in Singapore. “In Singapore, we are at the beginning of the outbreak.” Singapore has reported 47 cases and worry about the spread is growing. Its biggest bank, DBS (DBSM.SI), evacuated 300 staff from its head office on Wednesday after a confirmed coronavirus case in the building. Hundreds of cases have been reported in dozens of other countries and territories around the world, but only two people have died outside mainland China – one in Hong Kong and another in the Philippines.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Tuesday the world had to “wake up and consider this enemy virus as public enemy number one” and the first vaccine was 18 months away.
In China, total infections have hit 44,653, health officials said, including 2,015 new confirmed cases on Tuesday. That was the lowest daily rise in new cases since Jan. 30. The number of deaths on the mainland rose by 97 to 1,113 by the end of Tuesday. But doubts have been aired on social media about how reliable the figures are, after the government last week amended guidelines on the classification of cases. The biggest cluster of cases outside China is aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined off Japan’s port of Yokohama, with about 3,700 people on board. Japanese officials on Wednesday said 39 more people had tested positive for the virus, taking the total to 175. One of the new cases was a quarantine officer. Thailand said it was barring passengers from another cruise ship, MS Westerdam, from disembarking, the latest country to turn it away amid fears of the coronavirus, despite no confirmed infections on board. Travel restrictions that have paralysed the world’s second-biggest economy have left Wuhan and other Chinese cities resembling ghost towns. Even if the epidemic ends soon, it has taken a toll of China’s economy, with companies laying off workers and needing loans running into billions of dollars to stay afloat. Supply chains for makers of items from cars to smartphones have broken down.
A top Chinese Government virologist well known for his role in fighting against the SARS, says the coronavirus outbreak will reach its peak in February
The WHO raised the coronavirus alarm on Tuesday but China’s top virologist claims the outbreak will peak in February.
Top Chinese scientist believes the coronavirus outbreak will peak in February.
Various data and footage shared by the Western media suggest real numbers are much higher.
It has caused the Chinese people to protest online, wanting freedom of speech.
Zhong Nanshan, a top Chinese Government virologist well known for his role in fighting against the SARS outbreak some 17 years ago, says coronavirus will reach its peak in February.
Zhong Nanshan, is the head of the National Health Commission’s team investigating the novel coronavirus outbreak. | Source:. REUTERS/Thomas Suen
According to the latest update from the New York Times, the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in China have hit 42,000. On February 5, Primitive Crypto founding partner Dovey Wan revealed a report from Beijing-based mainstream publication Caixin was modified to remove the number of beds contained in 11 venues in Wuhan that have been turned into hospitals.
Various footage taken by citizen journalists in China released on platforms like Twitter seemingly show the Chinese police taking extreme measures such as welding apartment doors shut to prevent the coronavirus outbreak expanding. Balaji Srinivasan, a venture capital investor and chemical engineer acknowledged by the MIT, who has been actively covering updates on coronavirus, suggested that the intensity of pollution in China could have contributed to the worsening of the outbreak. Fears towards the ability of coronavirus to spread have noticeably increased when recent reports indicated the virus is easily transmissible airborne. CNN reported that a Hong Kong apartment was partially shut down after the authorities discovered that coronavirus had spread through pipes within the apartment building. The pace in which the virus is spreading and the Chinese government is rushing to build new facilities equipped with tens of thousands of beds indicate real numbers can be significantly higher. Earlier this week, the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) employed a new model to predict 500,000 people can be infected with coronavirus in Wuhan alone.
The forecasts of many high profile institutions including LSHTM and HKU show potential infections of up to half a million, with Leung’s model considering the possibility of the virus infecting more than 100,000 individuals per day.
There are concerns that the Chinese government is trying to lower the official numbers of coronavirus being raised by journalists who have covered China for a long time. Some analysts have described the outbreak as a “stress test” for President Xi, as the majority of the Chinese population’s dissatisfaction with the government’s handling of the outbreak grows.
Coronavirus patients WELDED into homes in China as death toll spirals to over 1000. In shocking clips posted on social media, masked men are seen blasting torches as they seal doors imprisoning sick residents.
A masked man welds an apartment building door amid claims coronavirus patients are being barricaded in their homes
Originally posted by As Breaking on Twitter, the videos are alleged to show a horrific standard practice as coronavirus panic grips the Chinese government. Activists have told how people suspected to be infected with the deadly disease are being left to “starve and die”.
It comes amid news that coronavirus has claimed more lives than the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak in 2003. A total of 774 people died in the SARS pandemic – another form of coronavirus that jumped from animals to humans.
Residents are welded inside their apartment blocks and left to die. #CoronaVirus.pic.twitter.com/XZrRoeDAVh
The new videos also show officials barricading doors with metal bars – and in one scene, a woman in a white lab coat appears to speak to somebody inside an apartment as a welder works on the door, sparks flying from his torch. Some tweets read that the residents were “being locked in while they are left to die”. Due to China’s super-strict censorship laws, it’s extremely difficult to trace exactly where the welding scenes were shot.
Another harrowing video also emerged yesterday that appears to show a woman recently returned from Wuhan being barricaded into her home by black-clad Chinese authorities. The woman can be heard screaming and yelling while a group of masked men fit thick metal bars over her door. A sign outside reads: “This family came back from Wuhan. Stay away, no contact”. The deathly virus – originated in Wuhan – has spread across the globe striking down thousands and killing hundreds, with more confirmed cases by the minute. Activists say as well as Chinese authorities, mob rule has gripped some panic-stricken neighbourhoods and groups of civilians are barricading infected people’s homes. There are also suggestions some members of the public are digging up roads leading to Wuhan and Hubei, two of the worst affected regions.
Meanwhile, communist regime in China has been pictured rounding up patients in Wuhan with the virus and taking them to camps. As well as those suspected of having the virus, China’s central government ordered that those close to the patients should also be put into the camps.
What we are witnessing is essentially a breakdown in government
Gordon Chang
According to an expert in Chinese affairs and censorship, Gordon Chang, the Chinese authorities are deliberately falsifying the coronavirus numbers. Mr Chang, an expert in Chinese affairs and censorship, said here has been a “breakdown in government” which means it has “just lost the ability to pick up corpses”. He told Fox: “I think that the government in Wuhan and some other cities have just lost the ability to pick up corpses. “What we are witnessing is essentially a breakdown in government and keeping accurate statistics is a very minor part of their priorities right now.”
Hazmat-suited officials haul out a man in a winter coatCredit: Twitter, @RFA_Chinese
A shirtless man is dragged across the floor yellingCredit: Twitter, @RFA_Chinese
The shirtless man resists the coronavirus copsCredit: Twitter, @RFA_Chinese
A previous video also allegedly showed a patient’s home being barricadedCredit: Twitter, @KenWong_
The coronavirus situation is being described as China’s Chernobyl after it was initially covered up for months. The latest official numbers breaching the 20,600 mark, with 2,790 cases believed to be critical. Case numbers are growing exponentially in China on a daily basis. Current measures, such as proper screening of those escaping Wuhan, are not being carried out as efficiently as Beijing claims.
GENEVA (Reuters) – The first vaccine targeting China’s coronavirus could be available in 18 months, “so we have to do everything today using available weapons”, World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva on Tuesday. He said the virus had been named COVID-19, explaining that it was important to avoid stigma and that other names could be inaccurate.
GENEVA (Reuters) – China’s coronavirus outbreak poses a “very grave threat for the rest of the world”, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday in an appeal for sharing virus samples and speeding up research into drugs and vaccines. WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was addressing the start of a two-day meeting aimed at accelerating development of drugs, diagnostics and vaccines against the flu-like virus amid growing concerns about its ability to spread.To date China has reported 42,708 confirmed cases, including 1,017 deaths, Tedros said. “With 99% of cases in China, this remains very much an emergency for that country, but one that holds a very grave threat for the rest of the world,” he told more than 400 researchers and national authorities, including some taking part by video conference from mainland China and Taiwan. Tedros, speaking to reporters on Monday, referred to “some concerning instances of onward transmission from people with no travel history to China”, citing cases this week in France and Britain. Five British nationals were diagnosed with the coronavirus in France, after staying in the same ski chalet with a person who had been in Singapore. “The detection of this small number of cases could be the spark that becomes a bigger fire. But for now it’s only a spark. Our objective remains containment,” he said.
Hong Kong residents evacuated from a residential building where a man and woman confirmed with coronavirus live tested negative for the virus, health authorities said on Tuesday, easing concerns of a cluster of the outbreak in the Chinese-ruled city. Many questions remain about the origin of the virus, which emerged at a wildlife market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December, and is spread by people in droplets from coughing or sneezing. “We hope that one of the outcomes of this meeting will be an agreed roadmap for research around which researchers and donors will align,” Tedros told the closed-door meeting, according to remarks made available by the U.N. agency. “The bottom line is solidarity, solidarity, solidarity. That is especially true in relation to sharing of samples and sequences,” Tedros said. “To defeat this outbreak, we need open and equitable sharing, according to the principles of fairness and equity.” Dr. Mike Ryan, WHO’s top emergencies experts, told reporters on Monday: “This is an amazing initiative to centralise our knowledge.” The aim was to identify gaps and generate scientific information for urgently needed medical interventions, he said. “This is not just simply scientific discourse, there are big issues to do with how that whole process is governed,” Ryan said, citing the need to “ensure equitable access” to any products derived from research and approved by regulators. “Bringing everybody together I think will give us a leap-frog moment in terms of coherence, priority-setting,” he said. A week ago, only two laboratories in Africa could diagnose the novel coronavirus but as of Sunday, the WHO expected every nation in Africa to be able to diagnose the disease.
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s Huanggang city, one of the hardest hit by the coronavirus outbreak, is still facing a severe virus situation and a lack of medical supplies, its Communist Party boss said on Tuesday. Huanggang is located in the central province of Hubei near to Wuhan, believed to be the epicentre of the outbreak. Huanggang has recorded the second highest number of deaths from the virus after Wuhan. Speaking at a news conference carried live on state television, Liu Xuerong said they also face a serious challenge in preventing the spread of the virus in rural areas. “At present, the epidemic situation in our city is still very severe,” Liu said. “We will seize the key window period, strengthen our proactiveness in work, and resolutely win the fight against the epidemic.” Huanggang has recorded 2,332 confirmed cases and 52 deaths as of midnight on Feb 10, he added.
