China Mainland reports 40 new COVID-19 positive cases; 39 in Jiangsu & 1 in Liaoning

The Chinese mainland on Sunday logged 40 new locally transmitted COVID-10 positive cases, including 39 in Jiangsu and one in Liaoning. However, no new deaths took place due to COVID-19 in China in the past 24 hours. As per china.org.cn reports, several other parts of China also recorded new Coronavirus cases on Sunday, including 18 in Yunnan, eight in Guangdong, five in Fujian, two each in Inner Mongolia, and Henan, and one in Beijing.

In the last 24 hours, China reported a total of 7,246 cases on Sunday on the mainland, taking the overall tally mark of the mainland to 92,605. Out of 7,246 COVID-19 positive cases, a total of 6,654 people have been recovered and discharged from the hospitals, while 592 are still fighting against the viral disease. Apart from 87,228 overall recovered cases of the mainland, a total of 4,636 people have died of coronavirus so far. In Hong Kong Special Administration Region (SAR), a total of 11,978 cases have been confirmed by the end of Sunday, out of which 212 persons have died so far. China.org.cn has also put light on the COVID cases in Taiwan i.e., 15,571 positive cases and 786 deaths.

Is China the COVID-19 pandemic origin?

It is a widely known fact that the WHO team which visited China in January this year to conduct the COVID-19 origins probe was not given complete access to raw data from the Chinese Government-run Wuhan Institute of Virology where studies were being conducted on SARS-CoV-2 viruses. The WHO team called for a follow-up probe into COVID-19 origins in China. The WHO team had said that Chinese authorities withheld crucial data that could have shed light on the COVID origins, potentially complicating efforts to understand how the global pandemic began.

Moreover, explosive documents have revealed that China discussed the weaponization of Coronavirus as far back as 2015. As per the document, People's Liberation Army (PLA) commanders had predicted that World War 3 would be fought with biological weapons, and on similar lines, the Chinese military scientists had discussed the weaponization of SARS coronaviruses five years before the COVID-19 pandemic originated and spread to various parts of the world.

The paper obtained by the US officials was reportedly written by military scientists and senior Chinese public health officials in 2015, according to The Australian, adding that it was a part of their own investigation into the origins of COVID-19. The shocking details again raised questions over China's role in the spread of coronavirus with major concerns about China's transparency on the origins of COVID-19.

(IMAGE: AP/PIXABAY)