China: Confirmed coronavirus cases surpass 80,000, death toll touches 3,042

Mainland China has reportedly confirmed 143 new cases of the coronavirus infection as of March 5, spiking the figures from 139 a day earlier, announced the National Health Commission of China. This soars the total confirmed cases in China to 80,552 bringing the global cases at 98,424 and global 3,042 fatalities as per the reports.

Wuhan City in the Hubei province which is the epicenter of the disease accounted for 126 new cases alone, while 16 new imported cases were detected in the country. This increased the confirmed cases among the foreign nationals to 36 who have been infected with the COVID-19, confirmed the reports. While there’s a down sliding trend in the total cases across China except for Wuhan, with 54,000 new recoveries involving patients discharged from hospital after medical treatment, cases abroad are escalating.

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Potential infections “imported” from abroad

At this time in China, the focus has shifted to potential infections “imported” from abroad with Beijing’s 4 cases linked to Italy as per media report. Health authorities in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangdong have stepped up measures to quarantine travellers from countries hit the hardest by coronavirus, which Beijing identified as South Korea, Japan, Iran, and Italy. Meanwhile, out of the 29 new fatalities confirmed in the central province of Hubei, at least 23 have emerged from the Wuhan, where the virus originated in December 2019.

As the global cases are drastically on the rise, several countries have imposed travel restrictions on its citizens and suspended visa issuance facilities to the high-risk countries. Several leading airline operators have grounded their transpacific and transatlantic fleet owing to the dip in the travel demands. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) has estimated approximately USD 63 billion and USD 113 billion revenue loss to incur to the airline operators, at least 19 per cent loss in worldwide passenger revenue as COVID-19 continues to spread, confirmed the international reports.

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