This is a live blog. Please check back for updates.
All times below are in Beijing time.
10:35 am: Japan reveals more information about infected people on cruise ship
Japan’s health ministry disclosed in a press briefing more details about the ten additional people it said tested positive for the virus on board a cruise ship. According to NBC News, Japan said the newly infected people came from:
- Japan: 4 (one woman in her 60s, two women in their 70s, one man in his 70s)
- U.S.: 2 (one woman in her 60s, another woman in her 70s)
- Canada: 2 (one woman in her 60s, a man in his 70s)
- New Zealand: 1 (a man in his 50s)
- Taiwan: 1 (a woman in her 70s)
The ministry declined to comment on their conditions and said that they would like to wait for the diagnosis from the medical facilities.
10:21 am: Australia PM: Economic impact is going to be ‘very significant’
Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison told Sydney’s 2GB radio on Thursday that he expects the economic impact from the new coronavirus to be “very significant,” owing to the country’s increased exposure to China, in terms of the number of Chinese visitors and students it receives.
China is Australia’s largest trading partner.
“We can’t pretend there’s no impact to a global virus like this, and we can’t pretend that we can make it like the day it was before the virus struck,” Morrison said, pointing out in previous instances of viral outbreaks, tourism in Australia dented in one quarter before bouncing back in the next.
As of Thursday morning, Australia’s health ministry said there have been 14 confirmed cases in the country.
9:45 am: Beijing city bans group meals
The city of Beijing said on Wednesday that caterers and individuals are not allowed to organize group gatherings, and that previous arrangement should be canceled or postponed. Rural collectives are also prohibited from organizing banquets, whether for festivals, birthdays or school promotions.
As of Sunday night, Beijing had more than 200 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus, with more than half due to group gatherings, according to state media. Hotels and catering services contributed 11.11 billion yuan ($1.6 billion) to Beijing’s GDP in the first quarter of 2019, or 20% of the total for the year, according to official data accessed through Wind Information. — Cheng
9:32 am: Qualcomm sees ‘significant uncertainty’ around the impact of coronavirus on supply chain
Chipmaker Qualcomm said the virus outbreak, which put most of China under an extended shutdown, could potentially affect the mobile phone industry.
“There is significant uncertainty around the impact from the coronavirus on handset demand and supply chain,” CFO Akash Palkhiwala told investors on the company’s latest earnings call. Qualcomm stock dropped about 4% in extended trading after it beat analysts’ estimates on the top and bottom lines, reporting first-quarter earnings of 99 cents a share on revenue of $5.06 billion.
8:51 am: Millions of chickens in China could be wiped out
Hundreds of millions of chickens in China are at risk of being wiped out as the shutdowns have hit supply chains. Transport restrictions are preventing much-needed animal feed such as soybean meal from getting delivered to poultry farms, according to analysts and Chinese state media.
There are over 300 million chickens in the virus epicenter of Hubei alone putting farmers in a dire situation, a local poultry association said. — Tan
8:12 am: 10 more coronavirus cases aboard quarantined cruise ship in Japan
7:33 am: China reports 563 total deaths, and 28,018 confirmed cases
China’s National Health Commission said that as of Wednesday night, a total of 28,018 cases have been confirmed and 563 people have died in the country. There were 3,694 new confirmed cases.
There were 73 additional deaths, with most of them in Hubei province.
7:04 am: Hubei reports an additional 70 deaths
China’s Hubei province reported an additional 70 deaths and 2,987 new confirmed cases related to the fast-spreading coronavirus as of the end of Wednesday.
The Hubei Provincial Health Committee said that 549 people have died in the region and a total of 19,665 cases have been confirmed thus far. The province, where the pneumonia-like virus was first detected, has accounted for most of the deaths related to the new coronavirus.
The view of the Wuhan Keting in Wuhan, central China’s Hubei Province. Wuhan in central China’s Hubei Province started converting three existing venues, including a gymnasium and an exhibition center, into hospitals to receive patients infected with the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), the headquarters for the epidemic control said late Monday.
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All times below are in Eastern time.
5:10 pm: Yum China temporarily closes 30% of China stores, could see losses
Yum China Holdings, which operates Pizza Hut and KFC in China, has temporarily closed more than 30% of its stores there. Same-store sales for the locations that stayed open plunged by up to 50% since the Chinese New Year holiday, the company said, adding that it can’t say when its locations may reopen or whether it will need to close more. “Looking into 2020, the coronavirus outbreak is a major public health situation in China,” CEO Joey Wat said in a statement, adding that the safety of employees and customers was a priority. The outbreak will have a “material impact” on its 2020 sales and profit — possibly even see a quarterly or annual loss, depending on the course of the outbreak, the company said. — Rogers
4:07 pm: New York City tests 5 people for potential coronavirus
The New York City Department of Health said it now has five “patients under investigation” for the virus and is awaiting test results on four of them from the CDC. “This means they had recently been in China and presented with fever and cough or shortness of breath without another common cause, like influenza and other respiratory viruses, identified through testing,” the agency said in a statement. The two new potential patients are both under 40. One has been hospitalized and the other is under isolation with daily monitoring by the health department. The specimen from the first suspected case sent to the CDC was negative, the department previously said.
Read CNBC’s coverage from the U.S. overnight: US can’t keep virus ‘out of our border,’ NYC has 2 new ‘patients under investigation’
— CNBC’s Christine Wang, Evelyn Cheng, Weizhen Tan, Kate Rogers, Berkeley Lovelace Jr. and William Feuer contributed to this report.
