NEW DELHI: China on Friday reported one death on Friday and 5500 new local infections, said locals dieasese control body. “China has always been publishing information on Covid-19 deaths and severe cases in the spirit of openness and transparency,” said Jiao Yahui from the National Health Commission (NHC) tolr reporters on Thursday.
The state media said COVID-19 testing requirements imposed by several places around the world in response to a surging wave of infections were ” discriminatory” in the clearest pushback yet against restirctions that are slowing down its re-opening.
Japan on the other hand began testing all passengers arriving from China as an emeregency measure agaisnt the sudden uptick in cases. Malaysia also said Friday it will screen all inbound travellers for fever and test wastewater from aircraft arriving from China for COVID-19 as a part of its measures to curb the outbreak following Beijing’s decision to lift its strict Zero-COVID policies. Malaysia joins countries like US, India, Japan and Italy in taking stringent measures against the new wave of coronavirus that emeregd in China. Those detected with fever and flu like symtpoms will be tested for COVID-19. Meanwhile, Indoneia on the other hand lifted all COVID-19 measures as the country’s population according to President Joko Widodo ‘already has antobodies against the dieases’.
WHO Chief Tedros on Thursday, in terms of the resuregnce of coronavirus said- Restrictions some countries have introduced in response to China’s Covid-19 surge are “understandable”, given the lack of information from Beijing.
“In order to make a comprehensive risk assessment of the Covid-19 situation on the ground in China, WHO needs more detailed information,” Tedros said on Twitter.
Hospitals across China have been overwhelmed by an explosion of infections following Beijing’s decision to lift strict rules that had largely kept the virus at bay but tanked the economy and sparked widespread protests. Ever since the virus’ first outbreak- more than 6.65 million deaths have been reported officially.