The quarantine measures have spread to cover more than 50 million citizens and flights to China have been severely cut back….
Americans arriving from China are now quarantined for several days…
Still the number of cases have multiplied at alarming rates in China and keep popping up in smaller numbers around the world…
All of this will have an effect on China’s people , economy and the economies of other nations…
Still, the number of confirmed infections has doubled roughly every four days, afflicting more Chinese cities and towns, and experts have questioned whether the government’s actions are imposing undue hardship on people while doing little to slow the epidemic.
As of Friday, government figures showed the virus had killed at least 636 people and infected at least 31,161, and many believe those official statistics are far from complete. The fatality rate for Hubei province as a whole was 2.8 percent as of Thursday.
The authorities have begun to direct patients in Wuhan to makeshift hospitals — including a sports stadium, an exhibition center and a building complex — that are intended to house thousands of people. Inspecting one of the centers, set up in Hongshan Stadium, Ms. Sun said that anyone requiring treatment should be rounded up, if necessary, and forced into quarantine.
“It must be cut off from the source,” she said of the virus, addressing city officials at the shelter, according to a Chinese news outlet, Modern Express. “You must keep a close eye. Don’t miss it.”
It was not clear how the already-strained facilities could handle an influx on the scale she seemed to suggest, or whether the new shelters were equipped or staffed to provide even basic care to patients and protect against spreading the virus.
Photos taken inside the stadium showed narrow rows of simple beds separated only by desks and chairs typically used in classrooms. Some comments on Chinese social media compared the scenes with those from the Spanish flu pandemic, the deadliest in modern history.
China’s leader, Xi Jinping, called the epidemic “a major test of China’s system and capacity for governance” on Monday. But appearing with Prime Minister Hun Sen of Cambodia two days later, Mr. Xi said the Chinese government’s efforts were “achieving positive results.”….