Coronavirus: All mainland China affected as Tibet reports 1st case

Jan 30, 2020
Beijing: With a confirmed case of coronavirus reported in Tibet, the disease has reached every region in mainland China, a media report said on Thursday.

With the death toll from coronavirus outbreak rising to 170, Chinese health authorities have said there were 7,711 confirmed cases in the country as of January 29, BBC reported.

Infections have also spread to at least 15 other countries.

The World Health Organization (WHO) will meet on Thursday to again consider whether the virus constitutes a global health emergency. “In the last few days the progress of the virus, especially in some countries, especially human-to-human transmission, worries us,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday.

He named Germany, Vietnam and Japan, where there have been cases of people catching the virus from others who have been to China.

“Although the numbers outside China are still relatively small, they hold the potential for a much larger outbreak,” the WHO chief said.

More people have now been infected in China than during the Sars outbreak in the early 2000s, but the death toll remains far lower. Sars, also a coronavirus, caused acute respiratory illness. IANS