Coronavirus Live Updates: U.S. and Australia Tighten Controls as Toll Passes 250 - The New York Times

Here’s what you need to know:

• U.S. and Australia bar foreigners who’ve recently been to China.
• More than 250 people have died, with nearly 12,000 infections confirmed.
• A Chinese doctor who called the virus ‘controllable’ regrets his words.
• A view of the epicenter from a New York Times reporter.
• Apple will close its China stores for a week.
• Chinese truckers bring food to a locked-down city.
• California health officials cast a wary eye.

U.S. and Australia bar foreigners who’ve recently been to China.

Travelers at Kennedy International Airport in New York on Friday. The United States will funnel all flights from China to just a few airports, including Kennedy, O’Hare and San Francisco International.Credit...Johnny Milano for The New York Times

The United States and Australia are temporarily denying entry to noncitizens who have recently traveled to China, hoping to limit the spread of the new coronavirus to their countries.

The American restrictions, announced on Friday, exempt immediate family members of American citizens and permanent residents. Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Australia’s temporary ban on Saturday, saying that “Australian citizens, Australian residents, dependents, legal guardians or spouses” would still be allowed into the country.

American officials also said that any United States citizen returning home who has been in the Hubei province of China within the past 14 days — believed to be the virus’s incubation period — will be quarantined for up to 14 days. Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, is in Hubei.

Those who have been to other parts of China within the past 14 days will be subject to “proactive entry screening” and up to 14 days of monitoring and self-quarantine.

The United States will also funnel all flights from China to just a few airports, including Kennedy in New York, O’Hare in Chicago and San Francisco International Airport.

How Bad Will the Coronavirus Outbreak Get? Here Are 6 Key Factors

Here’s what early research says about how the pathogen behaves and the factors that will determine whether it can be contained.

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the American actions were being taken because there were “a lot of unknowns” surrounding the virus and its transmission path.

“The number of cases have steeply inclined with every day,” Dr. Fauci said.

The announcement came as major air carriers suspended flights between the United States and mainland China. American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines said direct air service would be halted for months, news that rattled the stock market and industries that depend on the flow of goods and people. Qantas followed suit on Saturday, announcing its own suspension of flights to China.

Vietnam banned all flights coming from mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau until May 1, according to the United States Federal Aviation Administration. Only flights that have received approval from Vietnam’s civil aviation authority will be allowed during the ban, which took effect on Saturday.

More than 250 people have died, with nearly 12,000 infections confirmed.

Chinese officials on Saturday reported the highest death toll so far in a 24-hour period.

◆ The 46 new deaths in China raised the toll to 259.

◆ About 2,100 new cases were also recorded in the country in the past 24 hours, raising the worldwide total to nearly 12,000, according to Chinese and World Health Organization data. The vast majority of the cases are inside China; about 100 cases have been confirmed in 21 other countries.

◆ All of China’s provinces and territories have now been touched by the outbreak.

◆ Countries and territories that have confirmed cases: Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Australia, Malaysia, Macau, Russia, France, the United States, South Korea, Germany, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, Britain, Vietnam, Italy, India, the Philippines, Nepal, Cambodia, Sri Lanka and Finland.

◆ Cases recorded in Thailand, Taiwan, Germany, Vietnam, Japan, France and the United States involved patients who had not been to China.

◆ No deaths have been reported outside China.

A Chinese doctor who called the virus ‘controllable’ regrets his words.

A prominent respiratory expert who originally told Chinese state media that the coronavirus was under control and preventable has admitted that his choice of words was inappropriate.

Wang Guangfa, head of the department of pulmonary medicine at Peking University First Hospital in Beijing, compared himself and other medical professionals tackling the outbreak to soldiers walking onto a battlefield.

“All the bullets are flying,” said Dr. Wang, in an interview with Jiemian, a finance-focused news site founded by Shanghai United Media Group, which is controlled by the government of Shanghai.

In many ways the doctor, who has been widely criticized for his reassuring early statements, has come to symbolize how slowly China recognized the urgency of the outbreak. Dr. Wang himself contracted the coronavirus, apparently during a visit to Wuhan.

As the virus began to spread through Wuhan in early January, people who spoke out about it online were silenced by censors and, in some cases, held by the police, accused of spreading rumors. When journalists from Hong Kong visited a Wuhan hospital, police officers detained them for hours. (The Hong Kong news media were among the first to shed light on the fast-spreading virus.)

Dr. Wang initially said that the virus could not be spread by human-to-human contact. But 11 days later, he confirmed to state media that he had the virus, and that he may have contracted it during a trip to Wuhan with a group of experts.

In his interview with Jiemian, published on Friday, Dr. Wang said he had misdiagnosed himself as having the common flu, and that he had waited days before checking himself into a hospital. He said he had since recovered and was discharged on Thursday.

Asked why he had originally called the coronavirus “preventable and controllable,” Dr. Wang blamed limited information at the time of his Wuhan visit. A clearer picture of the virus’s transmissibility would have required “epidemiological data, which is difficult to judge,” he said.

“These controversies may have been a kind of misunderstanding,” Dr. Wang said of the criticism he had received. He also defended his original phrasing, saying that many outbreaks of infectious diseases in history were ultimately controlled in the end.

His interview has been widely shared on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like social media platform. Some of the most popular comments are from angry users.

“‘Could be prevented and controlled,’ Wang Guangfa,” said one user, who wrote under a pseudonym based on “Gorbachev” in Chinese characters. “Because of this line, the most critical half-month was squandered! And resulted in this.”

A view of the epicenter from a New York Times reporter.

Amy Qin, who covers China from Beijing, on Friday arrived in Wuhan, the city at the center of the coronavirus outbreak that has killed over 250 people so far. Follow Amy as she reports around Wuhan.

Amy arrived in a wary city that has been cut off from the rest of the world for more than a week.

Streets were mostly empty as people avoided contact with one another and stayed fearfully at home. Not everybody could bear to stay inside, however.

All around the city, authorities and businesses have worked to create an air of normalcy.

It’s clear, however, that the city has been strained to its limits by the epidemic.

Apple will close its China stores for a week.

Apple on Saturday said it would close its stores in mainland China, one of its biggest markets, until Feb. 9.

In a statement, the iPhone maker said it was closing stores, corporate offices and contact centers “out of an abundance of caution and based on the latest advice from leading health experts.” Its online store will remain open, it said.

The company operates 42 stores in mainland China, though its iPhones and other devices are widely available through other retailers.

Apple generates about one-sixth of its sales and one-quarter of its operating income in China. While its results there fell last year, Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, told investors last week that the company’s new iPhone 11 was selling well in the country.

But he also cautioned that the coronavirus outbreak had kept the company from offering more specific guidance about its financial performance in the coming months.

Mr. Cook also said the company was looking for ways to minimize supply disruptions. Apple makes most of its iPhones and other gadgets in China, usually in factories owned by third-party contractors like Foxconn of Taiwan.

Apple is only one of a slew of global companies reconsidering their China operations as the outbreak has spread. A prolonged slowdown or closure in China could have a major impact on global economic growth.

China’s central bank, the People’s Bank of China, addressed such concerns on Saturday, pledging to make sure the country’s financial system had enough cash to deal with the economic blow. It also said it would lower lending rates for companies. Local regulators in Guangdong Province, as well as in Beijing and the city of Chengdu, have also announced efforts to support companies.

Chinese truckers bring food to a locked-down city.

Early on Saturday, a group of truck drivers smoked cigarettes in the soft morning light as they waited to undertake a mission of national urgency: delivering fresh produce to the stricken city of Wuhan.

Broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, chili peppers and more were due to head there by the truckload from Shouguang, an eastern city that is one of China’s biggest vegetable producers.

The coronavirus is testing one of the Chinese government’s proudest achievements: its ability to feed its 1.4 billion people.

As anxious shoppers around the country load up on provisions, many shops and supermarkets have been selling out of fresh food each morning, leaving slim pickings by midday. Towns and villages in many places have also closed off roads to passing traffic, which has caused some truck shipments to take longer than usual.

So far, there have been no signs of a major breakdown in China’s food supplies. The government has ordered vendors to keep prices stable and punished stores that have gouged consumers.

Shouguang is one of several places in China that have donated vegetables to Wuhan in recent days. The Wuhan government has tasked three retailers with selling the goods and delivering the proceeds to the city’s virus-fighting budget.

On Saturday, the 10 or so trucks in Shouguang that were Wuhan-bound had been festooned with red banners that read, “Pull together in times of trouble, go Wuhan!” and “The people are united, fight the epidemic together.”

The journey would take four days in total. After the trip, the truck drivers would be sequestered at home for two weeks, because of the possibility that they’d been exposed to the virus. That might mean thousands of dollars in forgone wages.

Still, several of them said they had leapt at the opportunity to take part.

“I knew about the dangers,” said Ma Chenglong, a 34-year-old driver. “But when the country is in trouble, we common people have a duty.”

California health officials cast a wary eye.

A third confirmed case of coronavirus in California was announced on Friday, raising questions about the state’s vulnerability in the outbreak on the same day the federal government imposed a 14-day quarantine for the 195 people who arrived on an evacuation flight from Wuhan, China.

The three confirmed cases were in Los Angeles, Orange and Santa Clara Counties. In all, seven cases had been reported in the United States as of Friday night.

In Los Angeles County, the infected person reported to the authorities that he was feeling unwell as he was traveling back to Wuhan, China, the center of the outbreak. The patients in Orange County and Santa Clara County had also traveled to Wuhan.

Sonia Angell, director of the California Department of Public Health, said in a recorded video message that the health risk to the general public in California was low. “But we still consider this a serious public health concern,” Dr. Angell said.

The United States government has imposed a federal quarantine on the 195 people who were evacuated on Wednesday from Wuhan, China, to a California military base, officials said on Friday.

The group will be held at March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, Calif., for 14 days, to ensure that they are not infected with the coronavirus.

Travel constraints could disrupt operations at the United Nations.

Around the world, the growing number of constraints on travelers from China because of the coronavirus outbreak has reverberated to the United Nations, a hub of international diplomacy with operations that involve travel in all 193 member states.

In an advisory issued Friday evening, the organization’s headquarters in New York told staff members and their families that “they may be subjected to travel restrictions and health screening measures implemented by local authorities for travelers entering or exiting the country.”

While United Nations diplomats and other personnel were not banned from traveling, the advisory warned that “it would be prudent to make contingency arrangements should the need arise.” A page on the United Nations website provided staff members with practical steps and advice.

Reporting was contributed by Alexandra Stevenson, Elaine Yu, Amy Qin, Raymond Zhong, Michael Corkery, Annie Karni, Russell Goldman, Thomas Fuller and Carlos Tejada. Wang Yiwei contributed research.

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2020-02-01 08:50:00Z
52780579291157

Coronavirus Live Updates: U.S. and Australia Tighten Controls as Toll Passes 250 - The New York Times

Here’s what you need to know:

• U.S. and Australia bar foreigners who’ve recently been to China.
• More than 250 people have died, with nearly 12,000 infections confirmed.
• A Chinese doctor who called the virus ‘controllable’ regrets his words.
• A view of the epicenter from a New York Times reporter.
• Apple will close its China stores for a week.
• Chinese truckers bring food to a locked-down city.
• California health officials cast a wary eye.

U.S. and Australia bar foreigners who’ve recently been to China.

Travelers at Kennedy International Airport in New York on Friday. The United States will funnel all flights from China to just a few airports, including Kennedy, O’Hare and San Francisco International.Credit...Johnny Milano for The New York Times

The United States and Australia are temporarily denying entry to noncitizens who have recently traveled to China, hoping to limit the spread of the new coronavirus to their countries.

The American restrictions, announced on Friday, exempt immediate family members of American citizens and permanent residents. Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Australia’s temporary ban on Saturday, saying that “Australian citizens, Australian residents, dependents, legal guardians or spouses” would still be allowed into the country.

American officials also said that any United States citizen returning home who has been in the Hubei province of China within the past 14 days — believed to be the virus’s incubation period — will be quarantined for up to 14 days. Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, is in Hubei.

Those who have been to other parts of China within the past 14 days will be subject to “proactive entry screening” and up to 14 days of monitoring and self-quarantine.

The United States will also funnel all flights from China to just a few airports, including Kennedy in New York, O’Hare in Chicago and San Francisco International Airport.

How Bad Will the Coronavirus Outbreak Get? Here Are 6 Key Factors

Here’s what early research says about how the pathogen behaves and the factors that will determine whether it can be contained.

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the American actions were being taken because there were “a lot of unknowns” surrounding the virus and its transmission path.

“The number of cases have steeply inclined with every day,” Dr. Fauci said.

The announcement came as major air carriers suspended flights between the United States and mainland China. American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines said direct air service would be halted for months, news that rattled the stock market and industries that depend on the flow of goods and people. Qantas followed suit on Saturday, announcing its own suspension of flights to China.

The United States on Friday also joined the World Health Organization in declaring the coronavirus, which has sickened nearly 12,000 people and has spread to the United States and 21 other countries, a public heath emergency.

More than 250 people have died, with nearly 12,000 infections confirmed.

Chinese officials on Saturday reported the highest death toll so far in a 24-hour period.

◆ The 46 new deaths in China raised the toll to 259.

◆ About 2,100 new cases were also recorded in the country in the past 24 hours, raising the worldwide total to nearly 12,000, according to Chinese and World Health Organization data. The vast majority of the cases are inside China; about 100 cases have been confirmed in 21 other countries.

◆ All of China’s provinces and territories have now been touched by the outbreak.

◆ Countries and territories that have confirmed cases: Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Australia, Malaysia, Macau, Russia, France, the United States, South Korea, Germany, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, Britain, Vietnam, Italy, India, the Philippines, Nepal, Cambodia, Sri Lanka and Finland.

◆ Cases recorded in Thailand, Taiwan, Germany, Vietnam, Japan, France and the United States involved patients who had not been to China.

◆ No deaths have been reported outside China.

A Chinese doctor who called the virus ‘controllable’ regrets his words.

A prominent respiratory expert who originally told Chinese state media that the coronavirus was under control and preventable has admitted that his choice of words was inappropriate.

Wang Guangfa, head of the department of pulmonary medicine at Peking University First Hospital in Beijing, compared himself and other medical professionals tackling the outbreak to soldiers walking onto a battlefield.

“All the bullets are flying,” said Dr. Wang, in an interview with Jiemian, a finance-focused news site founded by Shanghai United Media Group, which is controlled by the government of Shanghai.

In many ways the doctor, who has been widely criticized for his reassuring early statements, has come to symbolize how slowly China recognized the urgency of the outbreak. Dr. Wang himself contracted the coronavirus, apparently during a visit to Wuhan.

As the virus began to spread through Wuhan in early January, people who spoke out about it online were silenced by censors and, in some cases, held by the police, accused of spreading rumors. When journalists from Hong Kong visited a Wuhan hospital, police officers detained them for hours. (The Hong Kong news media were among the first to shed light on the fast-spreading virus.)

Dr. Wang initially said that the virus could not be spread by human-to-human contact. But 11 days later, he confirmed to state media that he had the virus, and that he may have contracted it during a trip to Wuhan with a group of experts.

In his interview with Jiemian, published on Friday, Dr. Wang said he had misdiagnosed himself as having the common flu, and that he had waited days before checking himself into a hospital. He said he had since recovered and was discharged on Thursday.

Asked why he had originally called the coronavirus “preventable and controllable,” Dr. Wang blamed limited information at the time of his Wuhan visit. A clearer picture of the virus’s transmissibility would have required “epidemiological data, which is difficult to judge,” he said.

“These controversies may have been a kind of misunderstanding,” Dr. Wang said of the criticism he had received. He also defended his original phrasing, saying that many outbreaks of infectious diseases in history were ultimately controlled in the end.

His interview has been widely shared on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like social media platform. Some of the most popular comments are from angry users.

“‘Could be prevented and controlled,’ Wang Guangfa,” said one user, who wrote under a pseudonym based on “Gorbachev” in Chinese characters. “Because of this line, the most critical half-month was squandered! And resulted in this.”

A view of the epicenter from a New York Times reporter.

Amy Qin, who covers China from Beijing, on Friday arrived in Wuhan, the city at the center of the coronavirus outbreak that has killed over 250 people so far. Follow Amy as she reports around Wuhan.

Amy arrived in a wary city that has been cut off from the rest of the world for more than a week.

Streets were mostly empty as people avoided contact with one another and stayed fearfully at home. Not everybody could bear to stay inside, however.

All around the city, authorities and businesses have worked to create an air of normalcy.

It’s clear, however, that the city has been strained to its limits by the epidemic.

Apple will close its China stores for a week.

Apple on Saturday said it would close its stores in mainland China, one of its biggest markets, until Feb. 9.

In a statement, the iPhone maker said it was closing stores, corporate offices and contact centers “out of an abundance of caution and based on the latest advice from leading health experts.” Its online store will remain open, it said.

The company operates 42 stores in mainland China, though its iPhones and other devices are widely available through other retailers.

Apple generates about one-sixth of its sales and one-quarter of its operating income in China. While its results there fell last year, Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, told investors last week that the company’s new iPhone 11 was selling well in the country.

But he also cautioned that the coronavirus outbreak had kept the company from offering more specific guidance about its financial performance in the coming months.

Mr. Cook also said the company was looking for ways to minimize supply disruptions. Apple makes most of its iPhones and other gadgets in China, usually in factories owned by third-party contractors like Foxconn of Taiwan.

Apple is only one of a slew of global companies reconsidering their China operations as the outbreak has spread. A prolonged slowdown or closure in China could have a major impact on global economic growth.

China’s central bank, the People’s Bank of China, addressed such concerns on Saturday, pledging to make sure the country’s financial system had enough cash to deal with the economic blow. It also said it would lower lending rates for companies. Local regulators in Guangdong Province, as well as in Beijing and the city of Chengdu, have also announced efforts to support companies.

Chinese truckers bring food to a locked-down city.

Early on Saturday, a group of truck drivers smoked cigarettes in the soft morning light as they waited to undertake a mission of national urgency: delivering fresh produce to the stricken city of Wuhan.

Broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, chili peppers and more were due to head there by the truckload from Shouguang, an eastern city that is one of China’s biggest vegetable producers.

The coronavirus is testing one of the Chinese government’s proudest achievements: its ability to feed its 1.4 billion people.

As anxious shoppers around the country load up on provisions, many shops and supermarkets have been selling out of fresh food each morning, leaving slim pickings by midday. Towns and villages in many places have also closed off roads to passing traffic, which has caused some truck shipments to take longer than usual.

So far, there have been no signs of a major breakdown in China’s food supplies. The government has ordered vendors to keep prices stable and punished stores that have gouged consumers.

Shouguang is one of several places in China that have donated vegetables to Wuhan in recent days. The Wuhan government has tasked three retailers with selling the goods and delivering the proceeds to the city’s virus-fighting budget.

On Saturday, the 10 or so trucks in Shouguang that were Wuhan-bound had been festooned with red banners that read, “Pull together in times of trouble, go Wuhan!” and “The people are united, fight the epidemic together.”

The journey would take four days in total. After the trip, the truck drivers would be sequestered at home for two weeks, because of the possibility that they’d been exposed to the virus. That might mean thousands of dollars in forgone wages.

Still, several of them said they had leapt at the opportunity to take part.

“I knew about the dangers,” said Ma Chenglong, a 34-year-old driver. “But when the country is in trouble, we common people have a duty.”

California health officials cast a wary eye.

A third confirmed case of coronavirus in California was announced on Friday, raising questions about the state’s vulnerability in the outbreak on the same day the federal government imposed a 14-day quarantine for the 195 people who arrived on an evacuation flight from Wuhan, China.

The three confirmed cases were in Los Angeles, Orange and Santa Clara Counties. In all, seven cases had been reported in the United States as of Friday night.

In Los Angeles County, the infected person reported to the authorities that he was feeling unwell as he was traveling back to Wuhan, China, the center of the outbreak. The patients in Orange County and Santa Clara County had also traveled to Wuhan.

Sonia Angell, director of the California Department of Public Health, said in a recorded video message that the health risk to the general public in California was low. “But we still consider this a serious public health concern,” Dr. Angell said.

The United States government has imposed a federal quarantine on the 195 people who were evacuated on Wednesday from Wuhan, China, to a California military base, officials said on Friday.

The group will be held at March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, Calif., for 14 days, to ensure that they are not infected with the coronavirus.

Travel constraints could disrupt operations at the United Nations.

Around the world, the growing number of constraints on travelers from China because of the coronavirus outbreak has reverberated to the United Nations, a hub of international diplomacy with operations that involve travel in all 193 member states.

In an advisory issued Friday evening, the organization’s headquarters in New York told staff members and their families that “they may be subjected to travel restrictions and health screening measures implemented by local authorities for travelers entering or exiting the country.”

While United Nations diplomats and other personnel were not banned from traveling, the advisory warned that “it would be prudent to make contingency arrangements should the need arise.” A page on the United Nations website provided staff members with practical steps and advice.

Reporting was contributed by Alexandra Stevenson, Elaine Yu, Amy Qin, Raymond Zhong, Michael Corkery, Annie Karni, Russell Goldman, Thomas Fuller and Carlos Tejada. Wang Yiwei contributed research.

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2020-02-01 08:31:00Z
52780579291157

Coronavirus Live Updates: U.S. and Australia Tighten Controls as Toll Passes 250 - The New York Times

Here’s what you need to know:

• U.S. and Australia bar foreigners who’ve recently been to China.
• More than 250 people have died, with nearly 12,000 infections confirmed.
• A Chinese doctor who called the virus ‘controllable’ regrets his words.
• A view of the epicenter from a New York Times reporter.
• Chinese truckers bring food to a locked-down city.
• California health officials cast a wary eye.
• Travel constraints could disrupt operations at the United Nations.

U.S. and Australia bar foreigners who’ve recently been to China.

Travelers at Kennedy International Airport in New York on Friday. The United States will funnel all flights from China to just a few airports, including Kennedy, O’Hare and San Francisco International.Credit...Johnny Milano for The New York Times

The United States and Australia are temporarily denying entry to noncitizens who have recently traveled to China, hoping to limit the spread of the new coronavirus to their countries.

The American restrictions, announced on Friday, exempt immediate family members of American citizens and permanent residents. Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Australia’s temporary ban on Saturday, saying that “Australian citizens, Australian residents, dependents, legal guardians or spouses” would still be allowed into the country.

American officials also said that any United States citizen returning home who has been in the Hubei province of China within the past 14 days — believed to be the virus’s incubation period — will be quarantined for up to 14 days. Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, is in Hubei.

Those who have been to other parts of China within the past 14 days will be subject to “proactive entry screening” and up to 14 days of monitoring and self-quarantine.

The United States will also funnel all flights from China to just a few airports, including Kennedy in New York, O’Hare in Chicago and San Francisco International Airport.

How Bad Will the Coronavirus Outbreak Get? Here Are 6 Key Factors

Here’s what early research says about how the pathogen behaves and the factors that will determine whether it can be contained.

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the American actions were being taken because there were “a lot of unknowns” surrounding the virus and its transmission path.

“The number of cases have steeply inclined with every day,” Dr. Fauci said.

The announcement came as major air carriers suspended flights between the United States and mainland China. American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines said direct air service would be halted for months, news that rattled the stock market and industries that depend on the flow of goods and people. Qantas followed suit on Saturday, announcing its own suspension of flights to China.

The United States on Friday also joined the World Health Organization in declaring the coronavirus, which has sickened nearly 12,000 people and has spread to the United States and 21 other countries, a public heath emergency.

More than 250 people have died, with nearly 12,000 infections confirmed.

Chinese officials on Saturday reported the highest death toll so far in a 24-hour period.

◆ The 46 new deaths in China raised the toll to 259.

◆ About 2,100 new cases were also recorded in the country in the past 24 hours, raising the worldwide total to nearly 12,000, according to Chinese and World Health Organization data. The vast majority of the cases are inside China; about 100 cases have been confirmed in 21 other countries.

◆ All of China’s provinces and territories have now been touched by the outbreak.

◆ Countries and territories that have confirmed cases: Thailand, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Australia, Malaysia, Macau, Russia, France, the United States, South Korea, Germany, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, Britain, Vietnam, Italy, India, the Philippines, Nepal, Cambodia, Sri Lanka and Finland.

◆ Cases recorded in Thailand, Taiwan, Germany, Vietnam, Japan, France and the United States involved patients who had not been to China.

◆ No deaths have been reported outside China.

A Chinese doctor who called the virus ‘controllable’ regrets his words.

A prominent respiratory expert who originally told Chinese state media that the coronavirus was under control and preventable has admitted that his choice of words was inappropriate.

Wang Guangfa, head of the department of pulmonary medicine at Peking University First Hospital in Beijing, compared himself and other medical professionals tackling the outbreak to soldiers walking onto a battlefield.

“All the bullets are flying,” said Dr. Wang, in an interview with Jiemian, a finance-focused news site founded by Shanghai United Media Group, which is controlled by the government of Shanghai.

In many ways the doctor, who has been widely criticized for his reassuring early statements, has come to symbolize how slowly China recognized the urgency of the outbreak. Dr. Wang himself contracted the coronavirus, apparently during a visit to Wuhan.

As the virus began to spread through Wuhan in early January, people who spoke out about it online were silenced by censors and, in some cases, held by the police, accused of spreading rumors. When journalists from Hong Kong visited a Wuhan hospital, police officers detained them for hours. (The Hong Kong news media were among the first to shed light on the fast-spreading virus.)

Dr. Wang initially said that the virus could not be spread by human-to-human contact. But 11 days later, he confirmed to state media that he had the virus, and that he may have contracted it during a trip to Wuhan with a group of experts.

In his interview with Jiemian, published on Friday, Dr. Wang said he had misdiagnosed himself as having the common flu, and that he had waited days before checking himself into a hospital. He said he had since recovered and was discharged on Thursday.

Asked why he had originally called the coronavirus “preventable and controllable,” Dr. Wang blamed limited information at the time of his Wuhan visit. A clearer picture of the virus’s transmissibility would have required “epidemiological data, which is difficult to judge,” he said.

“These controversies may have been a kind of misunderstanding,” Dr. Wang said of the criticism he had received. He also defended his original phrasing, saying that many outbreaks of infectious diseases in history were ultimately controlled in the end.

His interview has been widely shared on Weibo, China’s Twitter-like social media platform. Some of the most popular comments are from angry users.

“‘Could be prevented and controlled,’ Wang Guangfa,” said one user, who wrote under a pseudonym based on “Gorbachev” in Chinese characters. “Because of this line, the most critical half-month was squandered! And resulted in this.”

A view of the epicenter from a New York Times reporter.

Amy Qin, who covers China from Beijing, on Friday arrived in Wuhan, the city at the center of the coronavirus outbreak that has killed over 250 people so far. Follow Amy as she reports around Wuhan.

Amy arrived in a wary city that has been cut off from the rest of the world for more than a week.

Streets were mostly empty as people avoided contact with one another and stayed fearfully at home. Not everybody could bear to stay inside, however.

All around the city, authorities and businesses have worked to create an air of normalcy.

It’s clear, however, that the city has been strained to its limits by the epidemic.

Chinese truckers bring food to a locked-down city.

Early on Saturday, a group of truck drivers smoked cigarettes in the soft morning light as they waited to undertake a mission of national urgency: delivering fresh produce to the stricken city of Wuhan.

Broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, chili peppers and more were due to head there by the truckload from Shouguang, an eastern city that is one of China’s biggest vegetable producers.

The coronavirus is testing one of the Chinese government’s proudest achievements: its ability to feed its 1.4 billion people.

As anxious shoppers around the country load up on provisions, many shops and supermarkets have been selling out of fresh food each morning, leaving slim pickings by midday. Towns and villages in many places have also closed off roads to passing traffic, which has caused some truck shipments to take longer than usual.

So far, there have been no signs of a major breakdown in China’s food supplies. The government has ordered vendors to keep prices stable and punished stores that have gouged consumers.

Shouguang is one of several places in China that have donated vegetables to Wuhan in recent days. The Wuhan government has tasked three retailers with selling the goods and delivering the proceeds to the city’s virus-fighting budget.

On Saturday, the 10 or so trucks in Shouguang that were Wuhan-bound had been festooned with red banners that read, “Pull together in times of trouble, go Wuhan!” and “The people are united, fight the epidemic together.”

The journey would take four days in total. After the trip, the truck drivers would be sequestered at home for two weeks, because of the possibility that they’d been exposed to the virus. That might mean thousands of dollars in forgone wages.

Still, several of them said they had leapt at the opportunity to take part.

“I knew about the dangers,” said Ma Chenglong, a 34-year-old driver. “But when the country is in trouble, we common people have a duty.”

California health officials cast a wary eye.

A third confirmed case of coronavirus in California was announced on Friday, raising questions about the state’s vulnerability in the outbreak on the same day the federal government imposed a 14-day quarantine for the 195 people who arrived on an evacuation flight from Wuhan, China.

The three confirmed cases were in Los Angeles, Orange and Santa Clara Counties. In all, seven cases had been reported in the United States as of Friday night.

In Los Angeles County, the infected person reported to the authorities that he was feeling unwell as he was traveling back to Wuhan, China, the center of the outbreak. The patients in Orange County and Santa Clara County had also traveled to Wuhan.

Sonia Angell, director of the California Department of Public Health, said in a recorded video message that the health risk to the general public in California was low. “But we still consider this a serious public health concern,” Dr. Angell said.

The United States government has imposed a federal quarantine on the 195 people who were evacuated on Wednesday from Wuhan, China, to a California military base, officials said on Friday.

The group will be held at March Air Reserve Base in Riverside, Calif., for 14 days, to ensure that they are not infected with the coronavirus.

Travel constraints could disrupt operations at the United Nations.

Around the world, the growing number of constraints on travelers from China because of the coronavirus outbreak has reverberated to the United Nations, a hub of international diplomacy with operations that involve travel in all 193 member states.

In an advisory issued Friday evening, the organization’s headquarters in New York told staff members and their families that “they may be subjected to travel restrictions and health screening measures implemented by local authorities for travelers entering or exiting the country.”

While United Nations diplomats and other personnel were not banned from traveling, the advisory warned that “it would be prudent to make contingency arrangements should the need arise.” A page on the United Nations website provided staff members with practical steps and advice.

Reporting was contributed by Alexandra Stevenson, Elaine Yu, Amy Qin, Raymond Zhong, Michael Corkery, Annie Karni, Russell Goldman, Thomas Fuller and Carlos Tejada. Wang Yiwei contributed research.

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2020-02-01 07:45:00Z
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After 3+ years of negotiation, Brexit Day finally arrives for the U.K. - CBS News

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2020-01-31 16:18:18Z
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Live updates: Coronavirus deaths soar as U.S. warns against China travel - The Washington Post

Glenn Hunt EPA-EFE/Shutterstock Flight attendants in protective face masks walk through Brisbane airport in Australia on Friday. The number of confirmed coronavirus cases soared to almost 10,000, with more than 213 deaths recorded in China.

As the death toll from the coronavirus outbreak passed 200 Friday, all of the fatalities in China, the State Department told Americans not to travel to the country and advised those in China to consider departing. Here is what we know:

●The United States has issued a “Level 4” travel advisory for China, its highest level of caution, over the rapidly spreading outbreak. Japan followed suit, urging citizens to avoid non-urgent trips, while Singapore banned Chinese nationals from entering or transiting through the city.

●Two cases of coronavirus were confirmed in Britain, and the first case in Russia was confirmed. South Korea reported an 11th case.

●China, anxious to shield Communist Party leaders from blame, dismissed a public health official over her handling of the crisis.

●The World Health Organization has declared the virus a global public health emergency, requiring states to ramp up their responses.

●In Hong Kong, officials closed schools until March as the number of confirmed cases rose to 12 and residents faced supply shortages.

WHO declares global emergency | U.S. reports first person-to-person transmission | Trump under growing pressure | U.S. airports screen travelers | Mapping the spread

10:25 AM: Major African carriers cancel flights; Myanmar turns China Southern plane away

WASHINGTON — On Friday, two major African carriers, Kenya Airways and RwandAir, said they were suspending all flights to and from China amid concerns that passengers could be carrying the virus.

There have been no cases of the virus in Africa, despite regular flights between major African and Chinese business hubs. Kenya Airways normally flies to Guangzhou each day, with a stopover in Bangkok. The first leg of that trip will continue as usual. RwandAir normally flies to Guangzhou three times a week. Earlier this week, Air Tanzania postponed upcoming plans to launch new regular flights to China.

Other flight paths have also been disrupted.

On Friday, Myanmar forced almost all passengers on a China Southern flight that originated in Guangzhou to turn back, after a passenger on board began displaying symptoms similar to those of coronavirus. The passenger disembarked in Yangon and is being treated in a hospital there.

Two Myanmar citizens who were on board the flight were allowed to enter the country but will be isolated for two weeks. Everyone else flew back to China, although none of them were displaying symptoms and it was not immediately clear whether the passenger who became sick was infected with coronavirus.

By: Siobhán O’Grady

10:24 AM: China’s foreign ministry criticizes U.S. for travel restrictions, ‘unfriendly comments’

WASHINGTON — China’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs has criticized U.S. officials for making “unfriendly comments” during the coronavirus outbreak, suggesting that some Americans were making remarks that were “neither factual nor appropriate.”

In a series of English-language messages on Twitter, the ministry’s spokesman also criticized a U.S. warning against travel to China. “In disregard of WHO recommendation against travel restrictions, the US went the opposite way,” the account said. “Where is its empathy?”

The United States has issued a travel advisory urging Americans not to visit China, and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, speaking on Fox Business on Thursday, said the coronavirus could “help” to bring jobs to the United States because companies would be moving operations away from affected areas.

By: Adam Taylor

10:12 AM: China to repatriate Wuhan residents, citing “practical difficulties” that they’ve encountered abroad

WASHINGTON — Chinese authorities are preparing to repatriate citizens from Wuhan who recently traveled out of China due to the “practical difficulties recently encountered” abroad, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Friday.

The ministry said officials are planning to charter flights and bring back residents from Hubei province who left before travel restrictions were put in place “as soon as possible.”

Chinese authorities have placed some 50 million people in Hubei province and its capital Wuhan under quarantine in an effort to contain the coronavirus outbreak. Nonetheless, authorities said some 5 million people traveled out of the area before to the restrictions but after the disease had already started spreading.

As the virus has reached other countries, international airplane carriers have canceled or cut down on flights to China, while some neighboring countries, like Russia and North Korea, have sealed off borders or limited entry from China. That’s in turn made it harder for Chinese people abroad to return.

The virus has also unleashed a global wave of fear and uncertainty — and incidents of racism and xenophobia toward Chinese people. Chinese students and tourists abroad have reported incidents of being denied entry to establishments and scapegoated as carriers of the disease just because of their nationality.

By: Miriam Berger

10:03 AM: Global markets sink on coronavirus fears

WASHINGTON — Global stocks sank Friday as investors confronted slowing economic growth in the U.S. and Europe, which could be compounded by the coronavirus outbreak that has forced China and its powerful economy into lockdown.

The deadly virus presents a huge threat to the global economy, as it paralyzes China’s workforce and dampens its powerful manufacturing industry, while forcing global firms with roots in the country to freeze operations and seek out ways to reorient supply chains. From an economic perspective, the outbreak’s timing is especially punishing, dragging down growth prospects and taking a bite out of corporate earnings just when investors had hoped for a boost after the truce in the U.S.-China trade war.

“Companies are taking decisive action over their exposure to China, such as canceling flights, closing stores and shutting factories,” Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, wrote Thursday in a note to investors. “It is already clear that earnings will be hit as a result of the coronavirus, and we still don’t know when the health incident will be contained.”

China’s markets are closed for an extended holiday, but Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 0.7 percent. Europe’s benchmark Stoxx 600 index was down 0.4 percent in midday trading, and Britain’s FTSE 100 was off 0.7 percent on the long-awaited official day of Brexit.

Read more here: “Global markets sink on slowing growth, coronavirus fears”

By: Taylor Telford

9:48 AM: North Korea, already isolated, takes further measures to seal itself off from outbreak

SEOUL — North Korea is taking all-out measures to seal itself off from the outside world as the coronavirus spreads to areas near the country’s border with China.

North Korea has not reported any case of coronavirus infection, but scores of cases have been confirmed in the Chinese provinces of Liaoning and Jilin, which border the isolated nation.

North Korea’s official party daily newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, ran a story Friday titled “A big strength to prevent the novel coronavirus.” The story cited the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un, calling for a development in health care for the North Korean people. Rodong Sinmun stressed the “very important duties” of North Korean authorities “to completely block the novel coronavirus from entering our country.”

North Korea announced that air and train routes between North Korea and China are temporarily suspended as of Friday, according to travel advisories issued Thursday by the U.K. government and the Indian Embassy in North Korea. The travel advisories said all foreigners entering North Korea from China, or from Russia and having passed through China, will be quarantined for a month.

North and South Korea have agreed to temporarily shut down the joint liaison office in the border city of Kaesong in a move to fend off any further spread of the virus. Seoul’s Unification Ministry said Friday that a new hotline has been opened to carry on the liaison effort between the two Koreas.

Via the hotline, North Korea has notified the South that it has postponed plans to demolish South Korean facilities at its Mount Kumgang resort to prevent the virus spreading.

By: Min Joo Kim

9:40 AM: India bans export of face masks, evacuates nationals

NEW DELHI — India’s Commerce Ministry banned the export of personal protection equipment, including N95 face masks and other protective clothing, in an order issued Friday.

The move follows a spike in demand for such products as cases of coronavirus spread to 22 countries outside mainland China. Indian authorities have confirmed one coronavirus case in the southern state of Kerala.

India also joined a growing list of countries evacuating nationals from China as coronavirus cases continued to surge in the country. A flight from Wuhan carrying more than 350 people, many of them students, is scheduled to land in New Delhi early Saturday morning local time. Incoming passengers will be quarantined for 14 days in Manesar, 55 miles outside the capital, New Delhi.

Two camps have been set up by the country’s armed forces, which will manage the facilities along with the Health Ministry. Those showing symptoms of coronavirus will be shifted to a hospital for treatment.

By: Niha Masih

9:35 AM: Risk of infection remains very low in Britain, chief medical officer says

WASHINGTON — After the United Kingdom confirmed its first two cases of coronavirus Friday, the country’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, said that the risk of infection there remained low — but that the chance of China losing control of the epidemic was his main concern.

“The risk comes from the situation in China going out of control, despite best efforts by the Chinese government, and spreading more widely,” Whitty said. “So that is the thing for which we are planning, that is the risk.”

Public health officials around the world have grappled with how to keep people continually informed about the outbreak, while at the same time not stoking undue panic. So far, the disease and deaths from it have remained centered in China, where authorities initially did not share news about the emerging new virus, which consequently made it harder to control as potentially infected populations continued to move around.

In contrast, countries such as the U.K. have put in place preemptive screening and testing procedures for high-risk travelers, techniques that public health officials say can dramatically reduce the risk of an outbreak.

By: Miriam Berger

9:34 AM: Germany confirms child of patient has virus

BERLIN — The number of coronavirus cases in Germany increased to six Friday, as authorities confirmed that the child of a patient in Bavaria had been diagnosed.

All five infected adults work for Webasto, an automotive supplier near Munich. Their condition is stable, authorities said.

A 33-year-old man became the country’s first confirmed coronavirus patient Monday, after being infected by a female business visitor from Shanghai.

She and the 33-year-old met at a workshop in the offices of the German automotive supplier.

Authorities said Tuesday that around 40 individuals had come into close contact with him and the Chinese visitor. Webasto temporarily closed its headquarters near Munich on Wednesday.

By: Rick Noack

8:41 AM: Italian government sets six-month state of emergency

ROME — The Italian government said it will impose a six-month state of emergency, as the country confirmed its first two cases of coronavirus.

The declaration — set to be officially announced later Friday — will free up funding and resources aimed at preventing the virus from spreading.

The Italian move came in response to WHO’s declaration of a “public health emergency of international concern,” which requires countries to ramp up their crisis response.

“In light of WHO’s international emergency we have activated all of the precautionary legal tools allowed by our country in such cases, just like in 2003 with the SARS outbreak,” Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza said in a statement.

Italy also suspended “all plane connections between Italy and China, until further notice,” according to a statement by the Italian Civil Aviation Authority.

States of emergency are declared relatively frequently in Italy, compared to other major European nations. A similar emergency was declared in Venice in November, when floods engulfed the city.

Even though both France and Germany have reported more coronavirus cases than Italy, neither have taken steps comparable to the Italian declaration.

By: Stefano Pitrelli and Rick Noack

8:10 AM: First coronavirus cases confirmed in Russia

MOSCOW — The first two coronavirus cases in Russia have been recorded, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova told reporters Friday. Both are Chinese citizens, she said.

One case is in Russia’s Far East Transbaikal Territory, a region that borders China, while the other is in the Tyumen Region, about 1,300 miles east of Moscow.

Golikova also announced that most flights to and from China have been suspended. The exceptions are Aeroflot’s regular routes to Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Guangzhou and Chinese Airlines’ flight to Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. Other preventive measures include imposing stricter border-crossing restrictions for those traveling from Mongolia.

Russia has already closed its entire 2,600-mile border with China over concerns of a coronavirus outbreak, and the country put out an advisory Friday for citizens to avoid hugging, kissing and literally letting their hair down to prevent the spread of the disease.

Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s consumer health regulator, suggested that people refrain from displays of affection, including handshakes, and secure their hair to limit contact with the face. It also advised people not to touch railings or doorknobs with bare hands.

Golikova said a decision on if to postpone an investment forum in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi amid concerns of a coronavirus outbreak will be made on Monday. The Russian Investment Forum is scheduled for Feb. 12, and one argument for pushing it back is the large Chinese delegation that was due to attend. Russia and China did $110 billion in trade last year.

By: Isabelle Khurshudyan

8:09 AM: Japan to tighten restrictions on Chinese nationals, Abe says

TOKYO — Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Friday his government would bar foreigners from entering the country if they had been in the virus-hit Chinese city in the previous two weeks and would also exclude any Chinese national whose passport was issued by the provincial government of Hubei, media reports said.

The Prime Minister’s Office said the plan to tighten immigration controls would be officially announced at midnight Japan time. In a statement, it said Abe told a specially constituted task force dealing with the crisis to implement measures so that “people infected with the virus will be denied entry into Japan.” Abe added that immigration controls must be strengthened even when the presence of the infection cannot be confirmed. Nikkei and NHK both reported details of the new plan.

Singapore on Friday banned all Chinese nationals from entering or transiting through the city-state, as well as any travelers who have been in mainland China in the past two weeks.

By: Simon Denyer

7:45 AM: China dismisses public health official

HONG KONG — Mindful of the political danger, China dismissed a public health official — her departure publicized by state mouthpieces in a rare, officially sanctioned show of accountability. Tang Zhihong, the health commission head of Huanggang, a city in Hubei province with the second-largest number of cases after Wuhan, was interviewed by a state broadcaster and fumbled her answers on the city’s response to the crisis. She could not state the number of available hotel beds in her city, nor its capacity to test for the virus.

After the clip was viewed some 40 million times, Tang was dismissed on Thursday night, becoming the first Chinese official to lose her job over the crisis. Her removal was carried in English by the Communist Party’s Global Times newspaper, which described her as “bumbling.”

By: Shibani Mahtani

7:30 AM: First cases confirmed in Britain add to global spread

HONG KONG: The outbreak, meanwhile, continues to spread. Britain on Friday confirmed the first two cases of coronavirus in England. “We have been preparing for U.K. cases of novel coronavirus and we have robust infection control measures in place to respond immediately,” chief medical officer Chris Whitty said.

In South Korea, health officials reported an 11th case. Earlier Friday, 368 South Korean evacuees from Wuhan arrived home on a government-chartered flight. They were screened for symptoms, with 18 taken to the hospital and the remainder placed in quarantine.

Germany and India, which have each confirmed cases of coronavirus, were preparing to evacuate their citizens in Wuhan by plane. More than 350 names were featured on a list drawn up by Indian officials, while Germany was planning to retrieve about 100 people.

Elsewhere, Mongolia extended the closure of its border crossings with China until March 2 and said it would not allow Chinese citizens to enter the country. Pakistan said it was halting flights to and from China with immediate effect.

By: Shibani Mahtani

7:15 AM: Significant fallout for Chinese travelers globally

HONG KONG — The fallout has been significant for Chinese travelers globally. Dozens of airlines have suspended flights to the country and many companies have urged their staff to stay away. From Italy to the Philippines, hotels and ports have been turning away Chinese citizens over fears that they may be infected.

The response at times has morphed into outright racism. In France, the hashtag #JeNeSuisPasUnVirus — “I am not a virus” — began trending, with those of Asian descent sharing their experiences of racism after a newspaper used the headline “Yellow Alert” to describe the outbreak.

Restaurants in South Korea have put up signs turning away Chinese clients. A student in Britain wrote in the Guardian that commuters have avoided sitting next to him because of his ethnicity. And after 7,000 people were held on a cruise ship in an Italian port over unfounded fears that two of its Chinese passengers were infected with the virus, officials have warned of latent and widespread racism against the Chinese community.

By: Shibani Mahtani

5:00 AM: State Department travel advisory an ‘extreme’ step, expert warns

HONG KONG — The State Department issued a travel advisory urging Americans not to visit China, the highest level of caution that is in place against only a handful of countries including Iraq and Afghanistan, as the numbers of those infected by the deadly coronavirus continued to soar.

The U.S. travel advisory, analysts say, represents a strong reaction from Washington amid rivalry with Beijing and pressure from the Trump administration for American businesses to shift production back home. The step is likely to have substantial implications for the Chinese economy, even though the warning is not mandatory for U.S. travelers to observe.

But James Zimmerman, partner in the Beijing office of law firm Perkins Coie LLP and former chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, said in light of the departure arrangement, the State Department’s travel warning appeared “extreme.”

It is “premature and suspect, and overreacting at best,” he said Friday. “The advisory is a clear reflection of how fear and a lack of trustworthy information can be an insidious combination.”

By: Shibani Mahtani

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2020-01-31 15:32:00Z
52780579291157

Live updates: Coronavirus deaths soar as U.S. warns against China travel - The Washington Post

Glenn Hunt EPA-EFE/Shutterstock Flight attendants in protective face masks walk through Brisbane airport in Australia on Friday. The number of confirmed coronavirus cases soared to almost 10,000, with more than 213 deaths recorded in China.

As the death toll from the coronavirus outbreak passed 200 Friday, all of the fatalities in China, the State Department told Americans not to travel to the country and advised those in China to consider departing. Here is what we know:

●The United States has issued a “Level 4” travel advisory for China, its highest level of caution, over the rapidly spreading outbreak. Japan followed suit, urging citizens to avoid non-urgent trips, while Singapore banned Chinese nationals from entering or transiting through the city.

●Two cases of coronavirus were confirmed in Britain, and the first case in Russia was confirmed. South Korea reported an 11th case.

●China, anxious to shield Communist Party leaders from blame, dismissed a public health official over her handling of the crisis.

●The World Health Organization has declared the virus a global public health emergency, requiring states to ramp up their responses.

●In Hong Kong, officials closed schools until March as the number of confirmed cases rose to 12 and residents faced supply shortages.

WHO declares global emergency | U.S. reports first person-to-person transmission | Trump under growing pressure | U.S. airports screen travelers | Mapping the spread

10:25 AM: Major African carriers cancel flights; Myanmar turns China Southern plane away

WASHINGTON — On Friday, two major African carriers, Kenya Airways and RwandAir, said they were suspending all flights to and from China amid concerns that passengers could be carrying the virus.

There have been no cases of the virus in Africa, despite regular flights between major African and Chinese business hubs. Kenya Airways normally flies to Guangzhou each day, with a stopover in Bangkok. The first leg of that trip will continue as usual. RwandAir normally flies to Guangzhou three times a week. Earlier this week, Air Tanzania postponed upcoming plans to launch new regular flights to China.

Other flight paths have also been disrupted.

On Friday, Myanmar forced almost all passengers on a China Southern flight that originated in Guangzhou to turn back, after a passenger on board began displaying symptoms similar to those of coronavirus. The passenger disembarked in Yangon and is being treated in a hospital there.

Two Myanmar citizens who were on board the flight were allowed to enter the country but will be isolated for two weeks. Everyone else flew back to China, although none of them were displaying symptoms and it was not immediately clear whether the passenger who became sick was infected with coronavirus.

By: Siobhán O’Grady

10:24 AM: China’s foreign ministry criticizes U.S. for travel restrictions, ‘unfriendly comments’

WASHINGTON — China’s Ministry for Foreign Affairs has criticized U.S. officials for making “unfriendly comments” during the coronavirus outbreak, suggesting that some Americans were making remarks that were “neither factual nor appropriate.”

In a series of English-language messages on Twitter, the ministry’s spokesman also criticized a U.S. warning against travel to China. “In disregard of WHO recommendation against travel restrictions, the US went the opposite way,” the account said. “Where is its empathy?”

The United States has issued a travel advisory urging Americans not to visit China, and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, speaking on Fox Business on Thursday, said the coronavirus could “help” to bring jobs to the United States because companies would be moving operations away from affected areas.

By: Adam Taylor

10:12 AM: China to repatriate Wuhan residents, citing “practical difficulties” that they’ve encountered abroad

WASHINGTON — Chinese authorities are preparing to repatriate citizens from Wuhan who recently traveled out of China due to the “practical difficulties recently encountered” abroad, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Friday.

The ministry said officials are planning to charter flights and bring back residents from Hubei province who left before travel restrictions were put in place “as soon as possible.”

Chinese authorities have placed some 50 million people in Hubei province and its capital Wuhan under quarantine in an effort to contain the coronavirus outbreak. Nonetheless, authorities said some 5 million people traveled out of the area before to the restrictions but after the disease had already started spreading.

As the virus has reached other countries, international airplane carriers have canceled or cut down on flights to China, while some neighboring countries, like Russia and North Korea, have sealed off borders or limited entry from China. That’s in turn made it harder for Chinese people abroad to return.

The virus has also unleashed a global wave of fear and uncertainty — and incidents of racism and xenophobia toward Chinese people. Chinese students and tourists abroad have reported incidents of being denied entry to establishments and scapegoated as carriers of the disease just because of their nationality.

By: Miriam Berger

10:03 AM: Global markets sink on coronavirus fears

WASHINGTON — Global stocks sank Friday as investors confronted slowing economic growth in the U.S. and Europe, which could be compounded by the coronavirus outbreak that has forced China and its powerful economy into lockdown.

The deadly virus presents a huge threat to the global economy, as it paralyzes China’s workforce and dampens its powerful manufacturing industry, while forcing global firms with roots in the country to freeze operations and seek out ways to reorient supply chains. From an economic perspective, the outbreak’s timing is especially punishing, dragging down growth prospects and taking a bite out of corporate earnings just when investors had hoped for a boost after the truce in the U.S.-China trade war.

“Companies are taking decisive action over their exposure to China, such as canceling flights, closing stores and shutting factories,” Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, wrote Thursday in a note to investors. “It is already clear that earnings will be hit as a result of the coronavirus, and we still don’t know when the health incident will be contained.”

China’s markets are closed for an extended holiday, but Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 0.7 percent. Europe’s benchmark Stoxx 600 index was down 0.4 percent in midday trading, and Britain’s FTSE 100 was off 0.7 percent on the long-awaited official day of Brexit.

Read more here: “Global markets sink on slowing growth, coronavirus fears”

By: Taylor Telford

9:48 AM: North Korea, already isolated, takes further measures to seal itself off from outbreak

SEOUL — North Korea is taking all-out measures to seal itself off from the outside world as the coronavirus spreads to areas near the country’s border with China.

North Korea has not reported any case of coronavirus infection, but scores of cases have been confirmed in the Chinese provinces of Liaoning and Jilin, which border the isolated nation.

North Korea’s official party daily newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, ran a story Friday titled “A big strength to prevent the novel coronavirus.” The story cited the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un, calling for a development in health care for the North Korean people. Rodong Sinmun stressed the “very important duties” of North Korean authorities “to completely block the novel coronavirus from entering our country.”

North Korea announced that air and train routes between North Korea and China are temporarily suspended as of Friday, according to travel advisories issued Thursday by the U.K. government and the Indian Embassy in North Korea. The travel advisories said all foreigners entering North Korea from China, or from Russia and having passed through China, will be quarantined for a month.

North and South Korea have agreed to temporarily shut down the joint liaison office in the border city of Kaesong in a move to fend off any further spread of the virus. Seoul’s Unification Ministry said Friday that a new hotline has been opened to carry on the liaison effort between the two Koreas.

Via the hotline, North Korea has notified the South that it has postponed plans to demolish South Korean facilities at its Mount Kumgang resort to prevent the virus spreading.

By: Min Joo Kim

9:40 AM: India bans export of face masks, evacuates nationals

NEW DELHI — India’s Commerce Ministry banned the export of personal protection equipment, including N95 face masks and other protective clothing, in an order issued Friday.

The move follows a spike in demand for such products as cases of coronavirus spread to 22 countries outside mainland China. Indian authorities have confirmed one coronavirus case in the southern state of Kerala.

India also joined a growing list of countries evacuating nationals from China as coronavirus cases continued to surge in the country. A flight from Wuhan carrying more than 350 people, many of them students, is scheduled to land in New Delhi early Saturday morning local time. Incoming passengers will be quarantined for 14 days in Manesar, 55 miles outside the capital, New Delhi.

Two camps have been set up by the country’s armed forces, which will manage the facilities along with the Health Ministry. Those showing symptoms of coronavirus will be shifted to a hospital for treatment.

By: Niha Masih

9:35 AM: Risk of infection remains very low in Britain, chief medical officer says

WASHINGTON — After the United Kingdom confirmed its first two cases of coronavirus Friday, the country’s chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, said that the risk of infection there remained low — but that the chance of China losing control of the epidemic was his main concern.

“The risk comes from the situation in China going out of control, despite best efforts by the Chinese government, and spreading more widely,” Whitty said. “So that is the thing for which we are planning, that is the risk.”

Public health officials around the world have grappled with how to keep people continually informed about the outbreak, while at the same time not stoking undue panic. So far, the disease and deaths from it have remained centered in China, where authorities initially did not share news about the emerging new virus, which consequently made it harder to control as potentially infected populations continued to move around.

In contrast, countries such as the U.K. have put in place preemptive screening and testing procedures for high-risk travelers, techniques that public health officials say can dramatically reduce the risk of an outbreak.

By: Miriam Berger

9:34 AM: Germany confirms child of patient has virus

BERLIN — The number of coronavirus cases in Germany increased to six Friday, as authorities confirmed that the child of a patient in Bavaria had been diagnosed.

All five infected adults work for Webasto, an automotive supplier near Munich. Their condition is stable, authorities said.

A 33-year-old man became the country’s first confirmed coronavirus patient Monday, after being infected by a female business visitor from Shanghai.

She and the 33-year-old met at a workshop in the offices of the German automotive supplier.

Authorities said Tuesday that around 40 individuals had come into close contact with him and the Chinese visitor. Webasto temporarily closed its headquarters near Munich on Wednesday.

By: Rick Noack

8:41 AM: Italian government sets six-month state of emergency

ROME — The Italian government said it will impose a six-month state of emergency, as the country confirmed its first two cases of coronavirus.

The declaration — set to be officially announced later Friday — will free up funding and resources aimed at preventing the virus from spreading.

The Italian move came in response to WHO’s declaration of a “public health emergency of international concern,” which requires countries to ramp up their crisis response.

“In light of WHO’s international emergency we have activated all of the precautionary legal tools allowed by our country in such cases, just like in 2003 with the SARS outbreak,” Italian Health Minister Roberto Speranza said in a statement.

Italy also suspended “all plane connections between Italy and China, until further notice,” according to a statement by the Italian Civil Aviation Authority.

States of emergency are declared relatively frequently in Italy, compared to other major European nations. A similar emergency was declared in Venice in November, when floods engulfed the city.

Even though both France and Germany have reported more coronavirus cases than Italy, neither have taken steps comparable to the Italian declaration.

By: Stefano Pitrelli and Rick Noack

8:10 AM: First coronavirus cases confirmed in Russia

MOSCOW — The first two coronavirus cases in Russia have been recorded, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova told reporters Friday. Both are Chinese citizens, she said.

One case is in Russia’s Far East Transbaikal Territory, a region that borders China, while the other is in the Tyumen Region, about 1,300 miles east of Moscow.

Golikova also announced that most flights to and from China have been suspended. The exceptions are Aeroflot’s regular routes to Beijing, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Guangzhou and Chinese Airlines’ flight to Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. Other preventive measures include imposing stricter border-crossing restrictions for those traveling from Mongolia.

Russia has already closed its entire 2,600-mile border with China over concerns of a coronavirus outbreak, and the country put out an advisory Friday for citizens to avoid hugging, kissing and literally letting their hair down to prevent the spread of the disease.

Rospotrebnadzor, Russia’s consumer health regulator, suggested that people refrain from displays of affection, including handshakes, and secure their hair to limit contact with the face. It also advised people not to touch railings or doorknobs with bare hands.

Golikova said a decision on if to postpone an investment forum in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi amid concerns of a coronavirus outbreak will be made on Monday. The Russian Investment Forum is scheduled for Feb. 12, and one argument for pushing it back is the large Chinese delegation that was due to attend. Russia and China did $110 billion in trade last year.

By: Isabelle Khurshudyan

8:09 AM: Japan to tighten restrictions on Chinese nationals, Abe says

TOKYO — Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Friday his government would bar foreigners from entering the country if they had been in the virus-hit Chinese city in the previous two weeks and would also exclude any Chinese national whose passport was issued by the provincial government of Hubei, media reports said.

The Prime Minister’s Office said the plan to tighten immigration controls would be officially announced at midnight Japan time. In a statement, it said Abe told a specially constituted task force dealing with the crisis to implement measures so that “people infected with the virus will be denied entry into Japan.” Abe added that immigration controls must be strengthened even when the presence of the infection cannot be confirmed. Nikkei and NHK both reported details of the new plan.

Singapore on Friday banned all Chinese nationals from entering or transiting through the city-state, as well as any travelers who have been in mainland China in the past two weeks.

By: Simon Denyer

7:45 AM: China dismisses public health official

HONG KONG — Mindful of the political danger, China dismissed a public health official — her departure publicized by state mouthpieces in a rare, officially sanctioned show of accountability. Tang Zhihong, the health commission head of Huanggang, a city in Hubei province with the second-largest number of cases after Wuhan, was interviewed by a state broadcaster and fumbled her answers on the city’s response to the crisis. She could not state the number of available hotel beds in her city, nor its capacity to test for the virus.

After the clip was viewed some 40 million times, Tang was dismissed on Thursday night, becoming the first Chinese official to lose her job over the crisis. Her removal was carried in English by the Communist Party’s Global Times newspaper, which described her as “bumbling.”

By: Shibani Mahtani

7:30 AM: First cases confirmed in Britain add to global spread

HONG KONG: The outbreak, meanwhile, continues to spread. Britain on Friday confirmed the first two cases of coronavirus in England. “We have been preparing for U.K. cases of novel coronavirus and we have robust infection control measures in place to respond immediately,” chief medical officer Chris Whitty said.

In South Korea, health officials reported an 11th case. Earlier Friday, 368 South Korean evacuees from Wuhan arrived home on a government-chartered flight. They were screened for symptoms, with 18 taken to the hospital and the remainder placed in quarantine.

Germany and India, which have each confirmed cases of coronavirus, were preparing to evacuate their citizens in Wuhan by plane. More than 350 names were featured on a list drawn up by Indian officials, while Germany was planning to retrieve about 100 people.

Elsewhere, Mongolia extended the closure of its border crossings with China until March 2 and said it would not allow Chinese citizens to enter the country. Pakistan said it was halting flights to and from China with immediate effect.

By: Shibani Mahtani

7:15 AM: Significant fallout for Chinese travelers globally

HONG KONG — The fallout has been significant for Chinese travelers globally. Dozens of airlines have suspended flights to the country and many companies have urged their staff to stay away. From Italy to the Philippines, hotels and ports have been turning away Chinese citizens over fears that they may be infected.

The response at times has morphed into outright racism. In France, the hashtag #JeNeSuisPasUnVirus — “I am not a virus” — began trending, with those of Asian descent sharing their experiences of racism after a newspaper used the headline “Yellow Alert” to describe the outbreak.

Restaurants in South Korea have put up signs turning away Chinese clients. A student in Britain wrote in the Guardian that commuters have avoided sitting next to him because of his ethnicity. And after 7,000 people were held on a cruise ship in an Italian port over unfounded fears that two of its Chinese passengers were infected with the virus, officials have warned of latent and widespread racism against the Chinese community.

By: Shibani Mahtani

5:00 AM: State Department travel advisory an ‘extreme’ step, expert warns

HONG KONG — The State Department issued a travel advisory urging Americans not to visit China, the highest level of caution that is in place against only a handful of countries including Iraq and Afghanistan, as the numbers of those infected by the deadly coronavirus continued to soar.

The U.S. travel advisory, analysts say, represents a strong reaction from Washington amid rivalry with Beijing and pressure from the Trump administration for American businesses to shift production back home. The step is likely to have substantial implications for the Chinese economy, even though the warning is not mandatory for U.S. travelers to observe.

But James Zimmerman, partner in the Beijing office of law firm Perkins Coie LLP and former chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, said in light of the departure arrangement, the State Department’s travel warning appeared “extreme.”

It is “premature and suspect, and overreacting at best,” he said Friday. “The advisory is a clear reflection of how fear and a lack of trustworthy information can be an insidious combination.”

By: Shibani Mahtani

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2020-01-31 15:21:00Z
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