The death toll from a new outbreak of coronavirus on Tuesday exceeded 1000 people as the world health organization warned that infected people who did not go to China, can cause “more fire”.
The increase came after President XI Jinping visited hospitals in Beijing, dressed in protective gear, when he was conversing with the hospital staff and patients.
Advanced group led by a who international expert mission arrived in China, as the country tries to contain a viral epidemic that currently has infected over 42 000 people and covered about 25 countries.
On Tuesday it was 108 deaths — the first triple-digit increase since the advent of the virus.
The first death was reported on January 11. The number of deaths increased a thousand times in just one month, reaching 1 016, although the mortality rate remains relatively low 2.4 percent.
The Chinese authorities have blocked millions of people in several cities, while some governments have banned the arrival of China as a major airline has suspended flights to keep the disease away from their shores.
But the case with the British citizen, who passed the virus at least 11 other people, not being in China has caused fears of a new phase of infection abroad.
In most of the cases abroad were attended by people who were in Wuhan, a city in Central China, where a quarantine was declared at the end of last year, or people infected with other people that were at the epicenter.
Adult British citizen who has not been named publicly, caught the virus while attending a conference in Singapore, and then gave him a few countrymen while on holiday in the French Alps, before finally diagnosed in Britain.
From infected person five were hospitalized in France, five in Britain and one man on the Spanish island of Mallorca.
“The discovery of this small number of cases could be the spark that will become a large fire“—said Monday the head of the who tedros adhanom Gebreyesus.
“But now it’s only a spark. Our goal remains the deterrence. We call on all countries to use the window of opportunity that we have to prevent a larger fire, “said Tedros.
But Michael Ryan, the head of the who Programme on emergency situations in the field of healthcare, said “too early” to call a conference in Singapore “supersessionism event.”
“When people come together and then apart, there is always a concern, and this needs to be linked to risk management procedures, but you also can’t shut down the world, “said Ryan.
“Imminent threat”
The British government called the new coronavirus “a serious and imminent threat” and said that anyone with this disease can now be forcibly quarantined if it is considered a public health threat because the number of cases in Britain has doubled to eight.
On a cruise ship moored off the coast of Japan, has grown a group of cases, and on Board the “Diamond Princess” have 135 people have been diagnosed with the virus.
The ship was kept in quarantine since he arrived to the Japanese coast in the beginning of last week after the virus was discovered from a former passenger who landed last month in Hong Kong.
Advance team who arrived in China on Monday, headed by Aylward, who observed the reaction of the organization to the Ebola epidemic in West Africa in the years 2014-2016.
Ryan said that the team, which will lay the Foundation for a larger international mission, will seek to better understand “problems related to the origin and source of the virus, the problems associated with the severity of the disease.”
Officials punished
At the same time, the Chinese government dismissed two senior officials from Hubei province, Central province, where about 56 million people, including in Wuhan, since the end of last month they are under arrest.
The province has sacked the head of the Communist party and Director of the regional health Commission.
Local authorities in Wuhan and Hubei have been criticized for concealing the extent of the outbreak in early January. The majority of deaths and cases in Hubei.
Death revealing the doctor from Wuhan has prompted calls for political reform in China.
XI, who called the battle against the virus is a “people’s war”, largely hidden from the public eye since the outbreak throughout the country of Hubei.
But he came on Monday, he was photographed in the mask and the temperature was measured in a hospital in Beijing.
He called the situation in Hubei “still very serious” and urged to “take stronger measures” to curb the spread of the virus.
