People around the world are celebrating the Chinese Lunar New Year on Sunday. Many turned out in San Francisco for the festivities despite fears about the spreading and highly-contagious coronavirus.
In China, nearly 40,000 people have been infected and at least 900 have died. Outside of China, there have been more than 300 confirmed cases. the confirmed deaths surpassed the total number of people who died during the 2003 SARS epidemic, which killed 774 people, according to the World Health Organization (W.H.O.).
All but two of the 903 confirmed deaths have been in mainland China, with one person succumbing in the Philippines and another in Hong Kong. As of Sunday, there were 12 confirmed cases of the virus in the U.S. while 11 Americans who contracted the disease, along with 53 others, have been taken off a quarantined cruise ship in Japan.
The U.S. embassy confirmed over the weekend that an American citizen diagnosed with coronavirus died at Jinyintian Hospital in Wuhan, China, on February 6. It appears this is the first death of an American citizen from the disease.
Planes carrying about 300 Americans from the Chinese city at the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak arrived at military bases in California and Texas on Friday. Some of the Americans then continued on from Texas to Nebraska.
Passengers will be under a 14-day quarantine to protect against the spread of the virus. “Our top priority is keeping the risk to the American public low, and we’re working on all fronts to do that,” Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar told reporters.
Japan is scrambling to prevent 70 cases of coronavirus on the Princes Diamond cruise ship moored off Yokohama from becoming a far larger outbreak. The country is preparing to welcome visitors to the Olympic Games in Tokyo this summer and it needs to show that it can contain the infections. There are at least 13 Americans with coronavirus on board and passengers have been confined to their rooms.
China is being criticized for failing to respond to early warnings about the coronavirus. Dr. Li Wenliang, who has since died from the virus, was silenced when he tried to sound the alarm about the virulent new virus infecting people late last year.
