Tag: Wuhan

Wuhan virus cases may be 10 times higher than reported: China health study

  by Patrick BAERT Agence France Presse BEIJING, China (AFP) — The number of coronavirus cases in the Chinese city where the pathogen was first detected may have been 10 times higher than official figures suggest, according to a study by health authorities in Wuhan. About 4.4 percent of the city’s 11 million residents had developed antibodies against the virus causing Covid-19 by April, the report by the Chinese Centre for Disease Control (CDC) said. […]

Wuhan, Ground Zero for coronavirus epidemic, re-opens all schools

BEIJING, China (AFP) — Students in face masks returned to class Tuesday in Wuhan, the central Chinese city where the coronavirus first emerged last year, as the city opened schools and kindergartens for the first time in seven months. Nearly 1.4 million students resumed classes at some 2,800 kindergartens, primary and middle schools across the city, following the re-opening of high schools in May. State media broadcast images of thousands of students hoisting the Chinese […]

Wuhan tests nearly 10 million people, finds only 300 infections

BEIJING, China (AFP) — China tested almost 10 million people for coronavirus in just over two weeks in Wuhan, the city where the pandemic began, officials said Tuesday, reporting only a few hundred positive cases. Chinese authorities claim to have largely brought the virus under control but Wuhan officials — wary of a second wave — launched the program after new infections emerged for the first time since the city re-opened in April following more […]

Wuhan doctor at whistleblower’s hospital dies from coronavirus

BEIJING, China (AFP) — A Wuhan doctor who worked with coronavirus whistleblower Li Wenliang died of the virus last week, state media reported Tuesday, becoming China’s first COVID-19 fatality in weeks. Hu Weifeng, a urologist at Wuhan Central Hospital, died on Friday after being treated for COVID-19 and allied issues for more than four months, state broadcaster CCTV said. He is the sixth doctor from Wuhan Central Hospital to have died from the virus, which […]

Fresh test for Wuhan as cluster sparks mass virus screening

by Lan Lianchao and Hector Retamal Agence France Presse WUHAN, China (AFP) — Nervous residents of China’s pandemic epicentre of Wuhan queued up across the city to be tested for the novel coronavirus on Thursday after a new cluster of cases sparked a mass screening campaign. Lines of residents keeping their social distance formed at makeshift testing sites set up under tents in parking lots, parks and residential communities as rain trickled down in the […]

Wuhan to test entire population after new virus cluster: state media

WUHAN, China (AFP) — Wuhan plans to conduct coronavirus tests on the Chinese city’s entire population after new cases emerged for the first time in weeks in the cradle of the global pandemic, state media reported Tuesday. Officials have been ordered to submit by noon on Tuesday plans to administer nucleic acid tests on all residents in the city of 11 million people, according to an official notice carried by news outlets. “Each district should […]

China’s Wuhan reports first virus infection in over a month

SHANGHAI, China (AFP) — China on Sunday reported the first case of coronavirus in over a month in Wuhan, the city where the outbreak first started in December last year. China’s National Health Commission also reported the first double-digit increase in countrywide cases in nearly 10 days, saying 14 new infections had been confirmed. Two of the cases were imported into the country from overseas, the commission said. The virus first emerged in Wuhan, a […]

The Wuhan lab at the heart of the US-China virus spat

by Beiyi SEOW Agence France Presse BEIJING, China (AFP) — The Chinese laboratory accused by top American officials of being the source of the coronavirus pandemic conducts research on the world’s most dangerous diseases. US President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have both claimed that there is evidence the pathogen came from the lab in Wuhan — the city where the disease was first detected late last year. But the World Health […]

Students in China’s virus centre Wuhan return to school

BEIJING, China (AFP) — Chinese youngsters in the global virus epicenter of Wuhan filed back to class on Wednesday, wearing masks and walking in single file past thermal scanners. Senior school students in 121 institutions were back in front of chalkboards and digital displays for the first time since their city — the ground zero of the coronavirus pandemic — shut down in January. “School is finally reopening!” posted one user of Weibo, China’s Twitter-like […]

Virus detectives tracking COVID-19 to its genetic origins

by Amélie BOTTOLLIER-DEPOIS with AFP bureaus Agence France-Presse PARIS, France (AFP) — China reported its first cases of the new coronavirus in December. But was COVID-19 already silently circulating? To find out scientists are looking for “patient zeros” by tracking the evolution of the virus itself. This genetic detective work is tracing the family tree of the coronavirus that has killed tens of thousands in its relentless spread across the planet. It could also help find out if […]

Chinese writer faces backlash for ‘Wuhan Diary’

by Ludovic EHRET Agence France-Presse Beijing, China (AFP) — After Wuhan was sealed off from the world, acclaimed Chinese writer Fang Fang started an online diary about the coronavirus tragedy unfolding in her hometown. Her journal drew tens of millions of readers — but now that it is about to be published abroad in several languages, she is facing a nationalist backlash at home. Critics say the 64-year-old, who was awarded China’s most prestigious literary prize […]

Humans to blame for spread of coronavirus and other ‘zoonoses’

by Stéphane ORJOLLET Agence France-Presse PARIS, France (AFP) — Whether it came from a bat or a pangolin is not certain, but one thing is: the coronavirus outbreak that has killed tens of thousands and turned the world upside down comes from the animal world. It is human activity enabled the virus to jump to people, and specialists are warning that if nothing changes many other pandemics of this nature will follow. The name given to […]