February 14 coronavirus news

Our live coverage of the coronavirus outbreak has moved here.

All people returning to Beijing will be required to stay at home or under observation for 14 days in order to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, according to China’s state-run news agency Xinhua.

The Leading Group of Beijing New Coronavirus Pneumonia Epidemic Prevention and Control Office, which made the announcement Thursday night (local time), said that any individual refusing to do so will be “held accountable according to law.”

The novel coronavirus has spread throughout the world since the first cases were detected in central China in December, and the World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.

Meanwhile, a number of countries, such as the United States and Japan, have evacuated their nationals on flights from Wuhan, capital of Hubei p\rovince and the epicenter of the outbreak.

Here’s map showing places outside mainland China with confirmed cases of the coronavirus:

Nearly 64,000 cases of novel coronavirus have been reported in mainland China since Dec. 31.

Here’s a map showing where the confirmed cases are in mainland China, according to data from the World Health Organization:

President Trump thanked the country of Cambodia for allowing a cruise ship to dock in the country.

The ship, which left from Hong Kong, had been rejected by several Asian ports over the last few days over fears of coronavirus.

About the ship: The Westerdam, which is owned by Carnival Corporation but sails under the Holland America brand name, was supposed to be taking a 14-day cruise around east Asia, beginning in Hong Kong on Feb. 1 and concluding Saturday in Yokohama, Japan. 

But the governments of Japan, Guam, the Philippines, Taiwan and Thailand refused the ship permission to dock over fears of the coronavirus epidemic — despite there being no confirmed cases on the ship. 

Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen was on hand to welcome passengers disembarking in Sihanoukville today, and told reporters, “The real problem for Cambodia is not news of the coronavirus outbreak, now called the COVID19. But that is the sickness of fear.”

Officials said “full disembarkation” will take a few days. 

President Trump on Friday repeated the theory that the novel coronavirus will die out as temperatures rise in the spring, but scientists insist it’s just too soon to say for sure. 

Infectious disease experts studying the virus say it may have a seasonal variation, or it may not. Several tell CNN it’s too early to tell, and nobody knows enough about the novel coronavirus to make assessments about its behavior. 

“There’s a theory that in April, when it gets warm, historically, that has been able to kill the virus. So, we don’t know yet. We’re not sure yet. But that’s around the corner, so that will be a great thing in China and other places,” Trump said at a Border Patrol event at the White House.

CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield told CNN in an interview, which aired Thursday, that the coronavirus may or may not be around past this year and it may or may not follow a seasonal variation — insisting only time will tell. 

“We don’t know a lot about this virus,” he said. “This virus is probably with us beyond this season, beyond this year, and I think eventually the virus will find a foothold and we will get community-based transmission.”

Trump also estimated that there were “around 12” confirmed cases of novel coronavirus in the US. As of Friday, 15 individuals tested by the CDC tested positive for the coronavirus. 

US officials are working together to make a plan for Americans on board the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Japan, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, a director at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told reporters on Friday. 

There is no specific plan yet for the passengers, she said, but precautions are needed for the passengers — who may be at high risk from the novel coronavirus — and to avoid spread to others.

“It’s very important to all of us that all of these people are safe and taken well care of,” said Messonnier, director of CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has not yet returned to shipping coronavirus test kits to state labs after some tests were initially found to be faulty, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said Friday during a call with reporters.

The CDC wants to make sure that “every T is crossed before we put these kits back out, so we’re taking a little extra time here,” Messonnier said. She declined to give a specific timeline.

Why this matters: Earlier this week, the agency said some state labs had been unable to validate the test. The CDC is now remanufacturing a reagent used in the test that was yielding “indeterminate answers,” Messonnier said. 

“What we’re doing at CDC is reformulating those reagents,” she said, “and we are moving quickly to get those back out to our labs” with state and local partners. 

Before it began shipping these kits, the CDC was the only lab in the United States that could test for the virus. Experts say the new test kits open the door to confirming cases earlier, thus being able to take swift action to contain any further spread in the United States.

The CDC had previously announced plans to ship roughly 200 test kits to domestic labs and another 200 to international labs. Each test kit can perform 700 to 800 patient samples.

Public health labs in five cities will begin using existing flu surveillance to look for the spread of the novel coronavirus, Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said during a call with reporters today.

The cities are:

Messonnier said this efficiently leverages the existing influenza surveillance systems to track whether the novel coronavirus is spreading in communities within the United States.

The labs will test for the coronavirus in samples that are negative for influenza. 

Results from this will provide an early warning to trigger a change in the public health response, Messonnier said.

There have been 15 cases of the novel coronavirus confirmed in seven states: eight in California; two in Illinois; and one each in Arizona, Washington, Massachusetts, Wisconsin and Texas.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists 443 people as under investigation for the novel coronavirus across 42 states, according to an update posted to the agency’s website Friday.

Of them…

These numbers are cumulative since Jan. 21 and include people with travel history to China, as well as those who have been in close contact with confirmed cases or other people under investigation.

Confirmed cases in the US include eight in California, one in Texas, one in Massachusetts, one in Washington state, one in Arizona, two in Illinois and one in Wisconsin. There are two instances of person-to-person transmission, one in Illinois and one in California.

Two California cases and the Texas case are among evacuees from China.

This is an increase from Wednesday, when the CDC listed 420 people under investigation in 41 states, including 13 positive, 347 negative and 60 pending cases. 

On Wednesday, China reported far fewer cases of the novel coronavirus than it did the day before, signaling that the spread of the virus could be slowing.

But the numbers were back up yesterday with China announcing a major jump in both new deaths and new cases. 

There are many reasons we’re seeing this phenomenon, including variances in the incubation period and more people seeking treatment.

But one of the top reasons for the variation in numbers is the constantly changing definitions of what constitutes a case in China: Is it just when someone has a lab-confirmed test? Is it when they exhibit symptoms indicative of infection? Should someone who is asymptotic be counted?

The spike is partly due to a broader definition of what constitutes a confirmed case, to include people diagnosed on the basis of their symptoms rather than testing positive.

Keep in mind: This is normal. 

“It’s normal during the course of an outbreak to adapt the case definition,” Dr. Sylvie Briand, director of the World Health Organization’s Infectious Hazards Management Department, said during a news conference yesterday.

Here’s a look at reported cases, according to World Health Organization data. Remember: These totals may differ from those reported by Chinese health officials, who report updated totals at different times than the WHO.

The World Health Organization has not yet had talks with Japan about potential impacts the novel coronavirus outbreak could have on the upcoming Tokyo 2020 Olympics this summer.

The Games are due to open in less than six months.

“At this stage, there has been no specific discussion or specific decision made regarding those mass events,” Dr. Mike Ryan, WHO executive director of Health Emergencies Programme, told reporters during a briefing today.

He continued:

“We are very much engaged with those institutions and with those events, and we will and obviously offer them any support and technical advice regarding their own risk assessment,” Ryan said. “It’s not the role of WHO to call off or not call off any event. … We offer advice on risk reduction and risk mitigation measures.”

A German national in Spain’s Canary Islands who had previously tested positive for coronavirus has since tested negative twice, and has been released from hospital quarantine, a spokeswoman from Spain’s Health Department confirmed today.

“The German citizen who had tested positive to the virus and was quarantined in La Gomera has tested negative twice in later tests. He has been released from hospital following the necessary protocols,” the spokeswoman said.

“He was always asymptomatic but was kept in hospital after testing positive to the virus in the first test,” she added.

According to the Health Department, five German nationals who had been traveling with the individual in question were also quarantined, but tested negative to the virus.

This now leaves only one person infected with the virus in Spain – in Palma de Mallorca.

The World Health Organization-led joint mission to China is expected to touch down this weekend, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said today during a press conference.

The mission will include 12 international and WHO experts and a similar number of national expert counterparts from China, he said. 

The experts will be reviewing data, in-depth workshops and making field visits in three provinces, among other plans. Ghebreyesus said they will stay as long as they are needed, depending on the scope of work. He said the members of the mission are experts in their fields, but declined to describe the makeup of the international team.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has offered to send experts to China, but that offer has not yet been accepted. 

US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar told CNN that the US US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention first offered to send experts to China on Jan. 6.

“It’s dependent on the Chinese to make their decisions and facilitate that,” Azar said. “The World Health Organization, we believe, has secured agreement to deploy a WHO team with our US public health experts as part of that team. We are ready to go and we are waiting for final clearance from the Chinese government to make that happen.”

While cases of coronavirus have been reported in more than two dozen countries and territories across the world, the vast majority of cases — and deaths — have been in China.

Here’s a look at where the cases are throughout mainland China, according to World Health Organization data.

Remember: These numbers may differ from those reported by Chinese health officials, who report updated totals at different times than the WHO.

The United States has to be guarded in making any assessment, pro or con, about the numbers and facts coming out of China about the novel coronavirus, US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar told CNN.

“Some of the data issues might just be the chaos of a public health crisis,” Azar said, adding that it’s important for the World Health Organization to hold China to account for transparency and cooperation.

Azar reiterated the need to send experts from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to China, but did not know when that would happen. The CDC first offered to send its experts to China on Jan. 6. 

“It’s dependent on the Chinese to make their decisions and facilitate that,” Azar said. “The World Health Organization, we believe, has secured agreement to deploy a WHO team with our US public health experts as part of that team. We are ready to go and we are waiting for final clearance from the Chinese government to make that happen.”

Azar defended the administration’s policy that bans foreign nationals who have visited China in the past 14 days from entering the country, saying the Unite States has “limited public health resources” and needs to prioritize citizens who are returning from China.

 “Once they have been out of China for that 14 day incubation period they are welcome, as always, into the United States,” Azar said.

US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said his department and the rest of the government is “working aggressively” to protect the health of Americans.

He said so far, the US has seen “very limited impact,” but acknowledged that “that could change at any time.”

Azar responded to President Trump’s assertion that the virus will dissipate as the weather gets warmer, saying teams are hoping that’s the case, and planning as if it’s not.

“What the President is saying is, we hope it will respond the way regular coronaviruses do and be heat responsive. But it also could just as equally respond the way SARS — a coronavirus adaptation — responds and continue in the warm season. So the President there was expressing his hope, and my goodness, I’m sure we all hope that it will have that type of epidemiological curve but we’re planning as if it won’t.”

Watch more:

Health officials in Singapore have confirmed nine additional cases of coronavirus, bringing the citywide total to 67 cases.

None of the nine new cases had traveled to China recently, according to a statement from the Ministry of Health Friday.

At least six of the newly confirmed cases are linked to a cluster of cases related to the Grace Assembly of God church.

A further case involves a 61-year-old female Singapore citizen who is a family member of the 50th and 55th confirmed cases.

One of the two remaining cases is a 61-year-old male Singapore citizen who works at a private hospital in Singapore, and the remaining case is a 50-year-old Singapore citizen.

The Ministry of Health added that contact tracing for the confirmed cases is ongoing.

The Grace Assembly of God church cluster is currently the largest community cluster of cases in Singapore, with a total of 13 confirmed cases linked to it.

The other clusters include four cases linked to a construction site, three cases linked to a private business meeting in the Grand Hyatt hotel, nine cases linked to the Yong Thai Hang shop, and five cases linked to The Life Church and Missions Singapore.

According to the Ministry of Health, 17 confirmed cases have now fully recovered from the virus and have been discharged from the hospital.

A further 50 confirmed cases remain hospitalized, with six patients in a critical condition receiving treatment in the intensive care units of various hospitals.

Two more Japanese people have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, according to an announcement from the country’s health ministry.

One is a man in his 60s from Aicha Prefecture, the other a man in his 50s from Hokkaido. Neither has a history of travel to China, the ministry said.

That makes seven new Japanese cases today not from the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which is quarantined in Yokohama. It brings the total in Japan to 257, of which 219 are from the vessel.

Chinese President Xi Jinping called the coronavirus outbreak a “big test” for the country in a speech to Communist Party members, state television reported Friday night.

Efforts should be made to improve epidemic prevention and control, added Xi, who also called for an improvement in laws on public health and wildlife.

The President said biosecurity should be part of the country’s national security policies, and that China should avoid letting small infections turn into serious events by improving advance screening for diseases.

The small companies that drive China’s economy are worried about how much damage the novel coronavirus outbreak will cause. Without help or a reprieve from the disease, many may have only weeks to survive.

While some larger companies are reopening their doors after weeks of lockdowns designed to contain the epidemic, small businesses often can’t comply with the strict health rules now required in many regions and many don’t have the option of letting employees work from home.

A survey of 163 companies of all sizes across China found that less than half were able to get back to work this week, according to investment bank China International Capital Corp, which published the results. Even more alarming: A third of roughly 1,000 small and medium-sized companies surveyed by academics from Tsinghua University and Peking University last week said they could only survive for a month with the cash they have.

That could spell terrible news for China’s entrepreneurs — and an even worse reality for the country’s economy. About 30 million small and medium-sized businesses contribute more than 60% of the country’s GDP, according to government statistics published last September. The taxes they pay account for more than half of government revenue, and they employ more than 80% of China’s workers.

Read the full story here.

Another Japanese person has tested positive for coronavirus, making a total of five new cases today, according to the country’s Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare.

The latest case is a Japanese citizen who returned from Wuhan Province in China on a government charter.

The individual tested positive on screening before leaving the post-repatriation quarantine period and will be hospitalized for treatment.

That brings the total in Japan to 255, of which 219 are from the Diamond Princess cruise ship which is docked in Yokohama port. The country has seen one death due to the virus.

Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam announced a series of new financial support measures to help alleviate the economic impact of the coronavirus outbreak in a press conference Friday.

“Today’s initiative to announce the setting up of this fund with the estimated amount of HK$25 billion (US$3.2 billion) is a commitment to the people of Hong Kong,” said Lam.

Included in the fund will be subsidies for various business sectors that have been impacted by the outbreak, including a US$10,300 subsidy for travel agencies and retail businesses. Help for restaurants will range from US$10,300 to $200,000.

Lam also announced the government will give the Hospital Authority an additional US$650 million in funding to help deal with the outbreak.

Hong Kong’s Legislative Council will meet next week to further discuss the details surrounding the fund.

A Russian woman who escaped a hospital ward where she was under quarantine for novel coronavirus is facing a lawsuit filed by heath authorities for endangering the public, according to Russian state media.

The woman had returned from China in early February and was undergoing observation at the Botkin Hospital for Infectious Diseases in St. Petersburg, according to state news agency TASS.

She fled the hospital without permission by short-circuiting the electronic lock on the door to her ward, St. Petersburg’s chief sanitary physician said in a statement Thursday.

Nearly 230 Russian citizens are currently waiting to return from China, according to Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency.

Two coronavirus cases have been confirmed in Russia, according to the country’s consumer watchdog, the Federal Service for Supervision of Consumer Rights Protection and Human Well-Being. The two patients were Chinese nationals who traveled to Russia; one of them has recovered and left the hospital, TASS said.

Read the full story here.

Voluntary disembarkations from the Diamond Princess cruise ship have ended for the day, Captain Stefano Ravera told passengers on Friday.

The Diamond Princess has been quarantined in the Japanese port of Yokohama, but certain passengers have been allowed to leave the ship and complete their isolation period in Japanese government housing.

“Virus-free guests who met the criteria met by the Japanese ministry of health and who decided to spend the remainder of their quarantine ashore have disembarked this afternoon,” he said over the ship’s public address system.

Those eligible for disembarkation include:

Health officials in Hong Kong have confirmed three additional novel coronavirus cases, bringing the city-wide total to 56.

The 54th confirmed case had a family gathering with the 52nd and 53rd case in January, said Chuang Shuk-Kwan of the Center for Health Protection at a Friday press conference.

The 55th case involves a 70-year-old woman who visited mainland China in January and is now in critical condition, while the 56th case is a 61-year-old woman who developed a fever and breathing problems on January 12. She was hospitalized on February 3.

Thirty-six suspected cases have been reported over the past 24 hours and 114 patients remain in hospital, according to Sarah Ho of the hospital authority.

Five confirmed cases are in critical condition and a further four are in a serious condition, added Ho. So far only one patient has been discharged.

The Hong Kong Tourism Board announced that the city received 3.2 million visitors in January 2020, representing a 53% drop in the daily average from the first half of 2019.

In a news release published on Friday, the Tourism Board said the daily average number of visitors in January was 100,000, down from a 200,000 daily average prior to the start of last year’s political protests. The statement added that the “Mainland (Chinese) and short-haul markets were the most affected, recording a drop of over 50%.”

The Tourism Board said “the outbreak of COVID-19 (novel coronavirus) aggravated the declines, as some airlines have suspended flights to Hong Kong” while the government’s implementation “of measures restricting the flow of people between Hong Kong and the Mainland” also impacted cross border visitor figures.

The Tourism Board added that “Preliminary data in February suggests that the arrivals have continued to decline, with average daily arrivals falling below 3,000, of which 75% were non-Mainland visitors.”

Throughout January and February the Hong Kong government implemented a series of travel restrictions with mainland China which included partially closing the border and mandating that all travelers arriving from mainland China undergo a mandatory 14-day quarantine. As of February 14, Hong Kong has more than 50 confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus.

Four more people in Japan – not from the Diamond Princess cruise ship – have tested positive for novel coronavirus, the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare said on Friday.

That brings the total in Japan to 254, of which:

The latest cases on land include a woman in her 60s who is a taxi driver in Okinawa. She had given rides to passengers from the Diamond Princess during its stop at the island on February 1, prior to the quarantine.

Two other new cases are people from Tokyo who had close contact with a taxi driver who has previously been confirmed to have the virus.

The fourth person is a man in his 70s who was treated at the same hospital where a doctor tested positive for the virus on Thursday. That man, in turn, a surgeon in his 50s, was the first doctor to have been confirmed to have the virus; his case was announced on Thursday. The local government suspects that the hospital connection may be coincidental, because the man whose case was announced today developed symptoms before visiting the hospital on February 6.

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has said that a recession “is possible” due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus.

Speaking during a visit to the Changi Airport, Prime Minister Lee described the novel coronavirus “as a very intense outbreak” adding that the economic impact ” is already much more than SARS (severe acute respiratory disease).”

Lee added that the “travel industry has been substantially impacted, flights are down by a third and shops here are hard hit.”

As of February 13, Singapore has confirmed 58 cases of the novel coronavirus in the city.

More than 5,000 new cases of the novel coronavirus have been confirmed in China under the country’s new broader definition, bringing the global total to 64,435.

The number of deaths from Covid-19, the official name of the virus, has now risen to over 1,380 worldwide. All but three of those deaths took place in China.

A partial purge of officials in Hubei, the Chinese province at the center of the outbreak, began Thursday. The top provincial official has been replaced by a key ally of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Outside of mainland China, new cases were confirmed in Hong Kong and Malaysia, and a Japanese woman in her 80s died of Covid-19. The woman was not connected to the Diamond Princess cruise ship currently under quarantine at the Japanese port of Yokohama. The ship remains the largest single outbreak outside of China, with more than 200 confirmed cases onboard.

Health officials in China say 1,716 medical workers have contracted the novel coronavirus so far, including six who have died of Covid-19.

Concerns remain over the potential drag of the virus on the Chinese economy, and knock on effects that could have worldwide. Speaking Thursday, Chinese Vice Premier Hu Chunhua called for “all-out efforts to ensure stable employment” and instructed companies to avoid mass layoffs as the quarantines in place across much of the country cause a major downturn.

A top Olympic official told reporters in Tokyo on Friday that the Summer Games remain “on track” despite the outbreak of novel coronavirus.

Advice from the World Health Organization (WHO) indicates that “there’s no case for any contingency plans of cancelling the Games or moving the Games,” said John Coates, chairman of the Coordination Commission for the Games of the XXXII Olympiad Tokyo.

Asked by CNN’s Matt Rivers if he had 100% confidence that things would move forward smoothly and the Games would go ahead, Coates said, “yes I do.”

“We continue to monitor particularly the Chinese that will be coming here,” Coates said, adding that “the Chinese team are mostly out of China now – the athletes and officials” for training and qualifying events.

He said that any Chinese athletes or fans coming from China, particularly affected provinces, would have to adhere to any Japanese government protocols.

Meetings over the past two days in Tokyo “reinforced our confidence” that the Japanese government is properly addressing the virus, he said. “We’re going to be very reliant on the communications coming from the organizing committee, but also the national government.”

Yoshiro Mori, president of Tokyo 2020, said that the Japanese government had set up a headquarters to take “full and thorough measures” to address the outbreak, and “meetings have already been held and we are working to share information.”

Health officials in China say 1,716 medical workers have contracted the novel coronavirus so far, including six who have died of Covid-19, the disease caused by the virus.

Speaking to reporters in Beijing, Zeng Yixin, vice minister of China’s National Health Commission, said that “As of February 11, 1,716 medical workers have been infected,” adding that “unfortunately we have lost six medical workers.”

Of those cases, around 1,500 cases – or 87.5% – are in Hubei, the province at the center of the outbreak.

Zeng added that several new measures have been put in place to better protect medical workers including providing better conditions for medical workers to rest and ensuring they have enough equipment to treat patients.

Frontline workers will also receive $28 to $42 in daily allowances, China’s finance ministry said.

When China reported a drop in the number of new cases of the deadly coronavirus earlier this week, hopes were raised that the outbreak might be slowing down.

But on Thursday, health authorities in Hubei, the province at the center of the epidemic, announced there had been nearly 15,000 new cases overnight – almost 10 times the number of cases announced the previous day.

The government was quick to point out the outbreak didn’t suddenly get much worse; the authorities had simply changed the way they reported cases in order to allow more people to access treatment faster.

The shift in how new cases are diagnosed has compounded questions about whether the world can rely on the numbers coming out of China, amid criticism over the government’s handling of the outbreak.

Read more here

Eleven passengers from the coronavirus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship will be moved to shoreside quarantine facilities, the vessel’s captain told passengers this afternoon.

Diamond Princess Captain Stefano Ravera announced that those passengers who have met the criteria of the Japanese Ministry of Health for being at high risk if infected with novel coronavirus will disembark from the ship on Friday afternoon.

The audio recording of the announcement was sent to CNN by a passenger from Oregon called Kent Frasure.

So far, dozens of people onboard the ship have tested positive for the virus, the largest outbreak outside of mainland China. Japanese health officials have been testing hundreds of crew and passengers for a week now, as the ship remains under tight quarantine.

In a show of displeasure from the very top of the Chinese Communist Party, two high-profile local officials at the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak were purged from office on Thursday.

State media announced Thursday that the Communist Party chiefs of Hubei and Wuhan would be replaced with Ying Yong, former Shanghai mayor, and Wang Zhonglin, former party secretary in Jinan.

It isn’t the first removal of officials since the devastating outbreak of the coronavirus in the city of Wuhan.

The Hubei Provincial Health Commission’s party secretary and its director were both fired on Tuesday, according to state broadcaster CCTV.

Far from Hubei, the former head of the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office, Zhang Xiaoming, was demoted to deputy and replaced with a former protege of President Xi Jinping.

All the appointments show Beijing’s disappointment with how major crises, such as the Hong Kong protests and the coronavirus outbreak, have been handled at a local level.

Read more here

For many Chinese people stuck in their homes either by quarantine or lockdown, one of the biggest questions they face is: how to pass the time?

As the coronavirus epidemic shows little signs of passing, some are turning to computer games to keep themselves entertained during the long wait.

During the Lunar New Year holiday that falls in January or February annually, gamers in China usually have more time to play games anyway.

But this year, following the coronavirus outbreak, authorities decided to extend the holiday by almost three weeks in many places, leaving millions of people with a lot of time to fill.

“The evenings are empty, and I have free time. So at night, I’ll play ‘Peacekeeper Elite’ with friends,” said 24-year-old construction worker Yang Zhanchao. “We’ll set a time to log on and play together.”

Tencent’s mobile game, “Honor of Kings,” hit a new all-time high in daily average users during the week of January 30, according to Niko Partners, a research firm that focuses on the gaming industry in Asia.

“We attribute most of the increase to the impact of the novel coronavirus which led to more gamers staying at home instead of traveling or socializing outside of the home, allowing more time to play games,” Niko wrote in a report.

Read the full article here.

The novel coronavirus has spread throughout the world since the first cases were detected in central China in December.

There are now at least 585 confirmed cases of the virus in 27 countries and territories outside mainland China:

Read more about the patients in each place.

Mothers across Hong Kong are giving birth alone as public hospitals in the territory are banning partners from labor wards in a bid to contain the coronavirus outbreak.

Dee Cheung, 34, a Canadian-born Hong Kong resident, gave birth to a baby girl at 6pm on Monday, January 27. She found out her husband wouldn’t be allowed into the delivery room – or the labor ward to meet the baby afterward – when she arrived at hospital.

“He was pretty bummed … but I thought there’s not much he can do anyway,” Cheung said, adding that she understood why the decision had been taken. “It would have been nice if he could have been with me to rub my back. But honestly it was fine.”

Sandra Marco Colino, 42, a Spaniard who has lived in Hong Kong for 10 years, gave birth via a planned C section at 37 weeks, as she had placenta previa, which can cause severe bleeding during delivery.

Because her baby girl was just 2.2 kilograms at birth, she had to go to the Special Care Unit at the Prince of Wales Hospital. While Hong Kong battles the coronavirus outbreak, all parents have been banned from the unit to protect the most vulnerable babies from infection, meaning Colino and her husband didn’t meet their daughter until she was six days old.

“I felt nervous having to go through the procedure on my own, and my partner was devastated to have to miss his daughter’s birth. We did understand though that public safety comes first,” she said. “There was an eerie quietness everywhere in the building which I had never witnessed in a local public hospital before.”

Colina added that nurses took photographs of their baby in the Special Care Unit and would give them to her husband every day as an update.

Veronika, went through 30 hours of labor on her own at the Queen Mary Hospital, on Hong Kong Island.

“I felt lonely during long and painful labor hours … I just wanted someone to hold my hand and just be close. But they don’t provide those services … I understand the concern for virus spread prevention, and no visits of family, but it’s just unfortunate to have no support not only during delivery but anytime before or after. Plus, I can say that even if the staff is professional, you don’t get warm words or advice on how to breathe during contractions, how to relax, how to cope with stress.

Kloub’s husband met their baby girl, Aurora, on the street outside the hospital while he gave her some bags to take up to the ward.

CNN reached out to the Hong Kong Hospital Authority for comment but did not receive a response.

Although comparatively few cases of the novel coronavirus have been diagnosed in the US so far, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention aren’t taking any chances.

Speaking to CNN’s Chief Medical Correspondent Sanjay Gupta, CDC director Robert Redfield said that they were in “aggressive containment mode.”

“We don’t know a lot about this virus,” he said. “This virus is probably with us beyond this season, beyond this year, and I think eventually the virus will find a foothold and we will get community-based transmission.”

Currently there is no known cure for the virus and, by slowing the disease’s progression, Redfield said that the CDC has been given more time to work on one.

“The containment phase is really to give us more time. This virus will become a community virus at some point in time, this year or next year,” Redfield said. 

Redfield said that while there had been criticism on selected US travel bans in response to the virus, it was their first priority to “protect the American public.”

“I would rather be criticized for over-protecting America than under-protecting America at this stage,” he said.

Read more here.

Economies across China are suffering from the outbreak of novel coronavirus, which has shut down cities and left workers stuck at home for days or weeks.

In the Chinese special administrative region of Macao – the world’s biggest gambling center – the government has announced it would hand out $275 million in vouchers to help try to boost the economy during the outbreak.

In a statement Thursday, the Macao government called on its citizens to spend up by sending every resident a $374 electronic voucher which can only be used in a three-month period.

It will also provide a $75 healthcare voucher for every Macao permanent resident, as well as discussing further tax cuts and housing subsidies.

Casinos hit: The virus has had a devastating impact on tourism in the gambling enclave, which relies heavily on mainland Chinese visitors. Gambling is illegal on the mainland and Lunar New Year is usually a particularly busy time for Macao’s casinos. But not this year – tourism to Macao had dropped 73.6% year-on-year, the local government announced on January 29.

A total of 41 entertainment operations in the semiautonomous Chinese city were suspended for 15 days on February 4, according to the government. They include casinos, betting branches, theaters, cinemas, game centers, internet cafes, discos, bars, nightclubs and dance halls.

There was good news this morning for hundreds of passengers who had previously been stuck onboard the Westerdam cruise ship in southeast Asia.

According to tweets from the Holland America Line, some passengers today began to disembark from the Westerdam in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, met on the ground by Prime Minister Hun Sen.

The passengers had previously been unable to find a place to disembark the ship due to countries’ fears of a coronavirus outbreak on board.

It was turned away by Thailand, Japan, Taiwan and the Philippines. But it was announced Thursday that no cases have been found onboard after it docked in Cambodia.

According to Holland America, it will take some days to disembark all the passengers due to charter flight schedules.

Stuck in quarantine: Meanwhile, off the coast of Yokohama, Japan, the wait continues for passengers on board the Diamond Princess, where 219 cases of the virus have been found so far.

According to authorities on the ship, more infections are expected to be discovered before quarantine is lifted.

The ship is scheduled to stay under a 14-day quarantine until February 19.

New numbers from China’s top health body revised down an earlier death toll from Hubei province after saying duplications had been found in “data collection and recording.”

According to the National Health Commission, the current number of infections in mainland China is 63,851, up 5,090 from the day before, while the death toll has risen to 1,380.

In total, that brings the global total to at least 1,383 deaths and 64,435 confirmed infections.

Previous numbers released out of Hubei province this morning had suggested that the number of infected had climbed above 65,000 but Beijing now says that is incorrect.

Manchester United’s newest signing Odion Ighalo is training away from the first team due to novel coronavirus concerns following his arrival from China.

Ighalo joined United on January 31 from Chinese Super League side Shanghai Shenhua and although the risk posed is minimal – the city is hundreds of kilometers away from Hubei province which is at the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak – the club has opted to take precautionary measures.

United also decided against taking Ighalo on its winter break training camp in Spain due to concerns he may have difficulty re-entering the UK.

Current medical guidelines advise people returning to the UK from certain countries, including China, to be quarantined for 14 days.

Read more here.

Ning Zhu, a nurse in Wuhan, the central Chinese city at the heart of the deadly coronavirus outbreak, is restless.

Instead of helping on the frontlines, she has been under self-quarantine at home for weeks, after a chest scan on January 26 revealed that she had a suspected case of the novel coronavirus.

Zhu was told to wait for a nucleic acid test that would provide the final verdict, but it never came.

“Right now, it’s really a problem. Our hospital already has more than 100 people who are quarantined at home,” she told CNN over the phone.

The Chinese health authorities have so far not disclosed the number of infections of health care workers. But accounts shared with CNN and seen on social media suggest that the extent of the infection could be in the high hundreds.

In Wuhan there are 398 hospitals and nearly 6,000 community clinics.

Read the full article here.

A group of US evacuees who were taken out of the coronavirus epicenter in Wuhan last week and are now in quarantine have petitioned the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to test them as soon as possible.

The evacuees, who are currently at the Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in California, thanked the CDC for their support but asked to be tested to identify potential infections quickly.

“We believe testing everyone at the facility would help identify potential suspects as early as possible, so the appropriate treatment could be put in place,” according to the petition, which is written in both Chinese and English. 

Two people who were evacuated to Miramar have already been diagnosed with the virus and sent into isolation.

The CDC said that it is listening to the evacuees’ concerns but testing people who are asymptomatic may provide a false negative.

“A false negative could provide a false sense of security,” Christopher Braden, a CDC official who is with the evacuees in San Diego, said in a statement Thursday.

In a statement read out to the passengers of the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship, Japan’s vice minister for health, labor and welfare said the government appreciated their “understanding and cooperation.”

Visiting the ship this morning, minister Gaku Hashimoto said that he knew the situation was “difficult and inconvenient.”

“We also understand that there are many people who are hoping to go home as soon as possible, and people who have pre-existing medical conditions who are still on board,” he said.

Additional cases expected onboard: So far there have been 219 cases of the coronavirus found on board the Diamond Princess, the largest outbreak of the virus outside of mainland China.

Speaking to passengers Thursday, chief medical officer for cruise operator Princess Cruises Grant Tarling said that the quarantine was expected to end by February 19.

“However, as the situation is evolving daily, we do not know at this point what measures, if any, will be required before or after that date. We will keep you updated if or when we are informed of new information by the ministry,” he said.

Tarling said additional cases were likely to be identified onboard.

A series of emergency measures will be approved by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Friday to combat the novel coronavirus, according to the prime minister’s office.

The government will spend 15.3 billion yen ($140 million) on emergency measures, including bolstering testing and medical treatment capacity, doubling mask production to more than 600 million a month, and credits for small and medium-sized businesses hurt by the outbreak.

Another measure will call for 1,800 beds to be readied for patients and for virus research results to be shared internationally.

Biggest outbreak: The largest outbreak of the novel coronavirus outside mainland China is aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship quarantined in Yokohama, which has reported 219 cases, including a Japanese quarantine officer.

Japan has reported a further 31 cases of the virus outside of the ship, bringing the national total to 250. A Japanese woman in her 80s has also died from the disease.

The number of new infections in Hubei – the central Chinese province at the epicenter of the outbreak – rose sharply for the second day in a row today after the government adopted a new way of calculating how cases are recorded.

The Hubei health authority recorded 4,823 new cases of the coronavirus on Thursday, more than double the 2,097 new cases announced Tuesday.

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Death toll rises: Out of the more than 36,719 patients still hospitalized in Hubei, 1,685 are in a critical condition. The global death toll rose today to 1,486.

Leadership shakeup: The spike in cases comes amid sweeping changes to top leadership positions in both Hubei and Wuhan.

The Communist Party chiefs of both Wuhan and Hubei were removed from their positions yesterday and replaced with officials from outside the province. Two Hubei health officials were also sacked earlier in the week.

Global infections mount: Both Singapore and Hong Kong now have more than 50 cases of the novel coronavirus, with the former announcing Thursday that it had diagnosed eight new cases.

The number of infections globally has now risen to more than 65,000.

Cruise ship situation is ‘dynamic’: There have now been 219 cases of the coronavirus found on board the cruise liner Diamond Princess, which is in quarantine off the coast of Yokohama in Japan.

In a message to passengers, Grant Tarling, the chief medical officer of cruise operator Princess Cruises said the situation was still “very dynamic.” “The Ministry of Health has notified us that the quarantine period of 14 days will end on February 19. However, as the situation is evolving daily, we do not know at this point what measures, if any, will be required before or after that date.” he said.

The Hubei health authority has reported that 116 more people died of the coronavirus in Hubei province on Thursday, bringing the total number of deaths globally to at least 1,486.

The vast majority of the deaths are in mainland China, with only one death in Hong Kong, one in the Philippines and one in Japan.

China’s National Health Commission is expected to release numbers for all of China’s provinces later today.

Hubei authorities confirmed an additional 4,823 cases of the virus in Hubei, which brings the total number of cases in the epicenter of the outbreak to 51,986.

There are 36,719 patients who have been hospitalized in Hubei, including 1,685 who are in critical condition, according to the health authority. There are now 4,131 patients who have recovered and been discharged.

The global number of confirmed coronavirus cases has now exceeded 65,191.

A 39-year-old woman from China is the 19th person to be officially diagnosed with novel coronavirus in Malaysia, state news agency Bernama reported on Thursday.

She is a friend and relative of two of the previous cases and is currently in a stable condition in isolation, Bernama said.

According to the report, she arrived in Malaysia from Wuhan on January 25 with four other people.

There have been no deaths from the coronavirus to date in Malaysia.