Summary
- The official death toll in China from coronavirus has risen to 132, with 5,974 cases confirmed, overtaking the number of people infected in the mainland by the Sars epidemic in 2002-3.
- In the UK 130 people have been tested for coronavirus, with all results negative, according to the latest update from the Department of Health and Social Care.
- British nationals are due to be repatriated from Wuhan, the city at the centre of the outbreak, on Thursday morning. However, with the city on lockdown, fears have been raised that many may not be able to reach the airport.
- Finland, the United Arab Emirates and Tibet confirmed their first cases of coronavirus, while a fourth case was confirmed in France and a sixth in Australia.
- British Airways has suspended all direct flights to and from mainland China, following travel advice from the Foreign Office that warned against all but essential travel to the country due to the coronavirus outbreak
- Evacuation flights from Wuhan to Japan and the United States have taken place, repatriating about 200 Japanese and 200 US nationals.
- The World Health Organisation’s emergency committee will meet again on Thursday, the third time in a week, to evaluate whether the new coronavirus spreading from China constitutes an international emergency.
Updated
Britons in Wuhan "may not be able to reach the airport"
Fears have been raised that many of the British nationals registered for the evacuation flight from Wuhan tomorrow morning may not actually be able to make it to the airport to catch the plane.
The Guardian was contacted by Robert Dowling, from Nottingham, whose 22-year-old son is in Wuhan and had been due to get the flight. But Dowling’s son lives on the other side of the city, south of the Yangtze river which intersects it, and, with the entire city on lockdown, there is no means of travel to reach the airport.
The Foreign Office, Dowling said, is not helping Britons with their travel through Wuhan. He told the Guardian:
[My son] did phone up the Foreign Office for advice. They told him to go to the local police station to ask for transport. He did that and the police told him to phone the embassy.
On the group chat [on social media between British nationals in Wuhan] this is a constant theme with it sounds like quite a number of them not at all sure how they are going to get to the airport.
I have just spoken myself to the FCO and the person there was still saying that as far as he knew there was not meant to be any assistance in reaching the airport other than to send [Britons in Wuhan] an email to show to the road blocks.
The Guardian has contacted the Foreign Office for comment.
The World Health Organisation’s emergencies chief says China is taking “extraordinary measures in the face of an extraordinary challenge” because of the virus outbreak, the Associated Press reports.
Dr Michael Ryan said the epidemic remains centred in the city of Wuhan and in Hubei province but that information is being updated and is changing by the hour. Many of those affected experience only a mild illness and estimated that the death rate is at about 2%, he said. The death rate for SARS, a related virus, was about 10%.
However, the few instances of the new virus spreading between people in countries beyond China, including Germany, are of great concern, Ryan added. He said that is part of the reason why the UN health agency’s director-general has reconvened a coronavirus expert committee to meet Thursday. It will assess whether the outbreak should be declared a global emergency.
Ryan made his comments to reporters on Wednesday after returning from a trip to Beijing to discuss the new virus with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other senior government leaders.
To date, about 99% of the nearly 6,000 cases are in China.
Updated
A plane evacuating 201 Americans from the Chinese city at the centre of the virus outbreak has arrived at a southern California military base after everyone onboard passed a health screening test in Anchorage, where the aircraft had stopped to refuel, the Associated Press reports.
The jet landed shortly after 8am local time at March Air Reserve Base about 60 miles (96km) east of Los Angeles. Ground crew dressed in white protective clothing approached the aircraft shortly after it landed and three charter-style buses parked near the plane. Federal and local public health officials scheduled a media briefing for later in the morning.
All the passengers had already undergone two health screenings in China and were screened twice more in Anchorage by the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. One passenger received medical attention for a minor injury that happened before boarding the airplane in China, Dr Anne Zink, Alaska’s chief medical officer, told reporters after the plane left.
Updated
A major international summit on biodiversity set to take place in China next month is under threat because of the coronavirus outbreak, Patrick Greenfield reports.
The Chinese government and the United Nations are now considering postponing the planned negotiations for a Paris-style agreement on biodiversity, which had been due to take place between 24 and 29 February.
Biodiversity experts and government policy makers were set to meet in Kunming, Yunnan to discuss plans to protect a third of the world’s oceans and land by 2030. The United Nations told the Guardian that they are reviewing the in consultation with the Chinese government, the WHO and other agencies.
The British government is urgently pressing Beijing to allow dual nationals to leave China after public outcry over families being split up during the coronavirus evacuations, reports my colleague Jess Murray.
Only British passport holders who do not also hold Chinese nationality are being allowed to leave. The British embassy in Beijing is urging the Chinese to let dependents of British nationals and British-Chinese dual nationals leave too.
“Our priority is to keep British nationals and their family members together and we have urgently raised this with the Chinese authorities,” a Foreign Office spokesperson said on Wednesday.
The foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, raised the issue of dual nationals with his Chinese counterpart on Tuesday, but the Chinese government has maintained its stance.
The World Health Organization’s emergency committee will meet on Thursday, the third time in a week, to evaluate whether the new coronavirus spreading from China constitutes an international emergency, the WHO said.
“The committee will advise the director general on whether the outbreak constitutes a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC), and what recommendations should be made to manage it,” the WHO said in a statement issued in Geneva before a news briefing by senior WHO expert Mike Ryan on his return from China.
The emergency committee, composed of 16 independent experts, twice last week declined to declare a global emergency. But today, the WHO chief, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who recently returned from a trip to China, tweeted that he would reconvene the committee to discuss whether such a declaration was now warranted.
I have decided to reconvene the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee on the new #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) tomorrow to advise me on whether the current outbreak constitutes a public health emergency of international concern. pic.twitter.com/993YBQ6hol
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) January 29, 2020
Updated
Sudan suspects that two of its citizens who returned to the country from China are infected with the new coronavirus, the information minister told Reuters.
One of the pair, a man and a woman, had been in the region of Wuhan, the Chinese city at the centre of the virus, said Faisal Saleh. Both are under medical checks.
We will update if there is any further information or a confirmation on whether the pair are infected.
Updated
Finland announces first case of coronavirus
Finland has announced its first confirmed case of coronavirus, in a tourist from Wuhan who was visiting Lapland, the Helsinki-based Swedish language paper Hufvudstadsbladet reports.
The patient has been quarantined at Lapland’s central hospital in Rovaniemi after developing symptoms and seeking medical help. About 15 people may have been exposed to the infection.
Mika Salminen, the director of Finland’s institute of health and welfare said:
It was expected that illness cases related to tourism would also occur in Finland. The risk is still small that the disease is spreading in Finland, so you do not have to worry
We have prepared for any cases in Finland. The healthcare and laboratories have ready-made business models. The hospitals are prepared to investigate and treat coronavirus infections in isolated conditions
Updated
A fourth case of coronavirus has been confirmed in France, Le Parisien reports.
The patient is a Chinese tourist from Hubei province of about 80 years old, according to details released at a press conference on Tuesday. The man was in intensive care at a Paris hospital.
France was the first European country to confirm coronavirus infections, with three confirmed diagnoses announced last Friday.
Updated
More British scientists have been giving their reactions to the news that Britons evacuated from Wuhan will be placed in a 14-day quarantine.
Prof Mark Harris, Professor of Virology, University of Leeds:
The plans for an organised quarantine of people evacuated from Wuhan makes much more sense than a proposal that people would quarantine themselves. There is now very good scientific evidence that the incubation period before symptoms appear can be as long as 14 days. In addition, there is some limited evidence of spread from people who are not yet showing symptoms. Both of these issues highlight the need for quarantine. Although there are appropriately some concerns raised about the human rights issue, these need to be considered in the light of the wider risk to the population of the potential spread of the virus. Restricting person-to-person contact is the most effective way of preventing this spreading.
Prof Jonathan Ball, Professor of Molecular Virology, University of Nottingham:
Given the level of coronavirus infection, it makes sense to quarantine and test people being evacuated form Wuhan City. But we might lose sight of the fact that the outbreak seems more widespread than that and at some time, probably soon, a decision will have to be made about all Britons located in Hubei province and China in general, especially if the virus outbreak continues to escalate. If these people also need to be brought back, then the task in hand would probably become unmanageable.
The rapidity of this outbreak is startling and certainly much more rapid than Sars. The reasons for this are unclear, but clearly the larger the outbreak grows the more difficult it becomes to contain it using usual infection control measures – identifying then isolating infected people and tracing and monitoring their contacts.
At the moment, virus that has been exported from China to other countries has not led to significant onward transmission, although the identification of infected individuals in some of those countries that have not had direct contact with China is concerning as it reminds us that the virus has the capability of being passed on.
There are still too many unknowns – the true scale of the problem, the frequency of symptom-less infection, the amount of transmission that occurs by people with and without symptoms, the extent at which infected individuals have travelled and their destination – to be certain. It is certainly possible for this virus to become widespread and eventually become just another circulating human respiratory virus, but it’s still very early days and with little onward transmission in other parts of the world, this might not happen. If this scenario did play out, however, then we need to get a better handle on the relative frequency of severe disease and death so that healthcare structures are able to deal with it.”
Updated
Damien Gayle here, taking over the live blog from my colleague Aamna Mohdin, who has finished for the day.
If you have come across coronavirus news you think we need to look at, please do drop me a line. As usual, you can contact me via my Twitter account – @damiengayle – or via email on damien.gayle@theguardian.com.
Updated
130 people have tested negative in the UK for coronavirus, according to the latest update from the Department of Health and Social Care.
UPDATE on #coronavirus testing in the UK:
— Department of Health and Social Care (@DHSCgovuk) January 29, 2020
As of 2pm on Wednesday 29 January 2020, a total of 130 tests have concluded:
130 were confirmed negative
0 positive
Updates will be published at 2pm daily until further notice. pic.twitter.com/sD5Q7XeRYP
Updated
The UK has asked the European Union for help to repatriate its citizens from Wuhan – two days before the country leaves the bloc.
Janez Lenarčič, the European commissioner for crisis management, listed the countries that have requested help from the EU at a press conference this afternoon. The list includes Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Spain, Finland, France, Italy, Latvia, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, and the UK.
BREAKING: UK requests EU help in flying back citizens from China #CoronaVirus outbreak. Comes just two days before UK is due to leave the bloc. #CoronaOutbreak pic.twitter.com/LPWaF8UNqU
— Oliver Miočić (@olivermiocic) January 29, 2020
Updated
A 21-year-old British student in Beijing has been told she cannot leave her dorm room for 12 days after returning from a trip to Wuhan.
Georgia, who is at Tsinghua University, arrived in Wuhan on 12 January and returned to Beijing on 23 January after spending a few days in Dalian. She is showing no symptoms of the coronavirus but is quarantined to her room until 3 February.
She said:
“When I left Wuhan no one was really wearing a mask. Some people were even under the impression that the situation was getting better.
The university wanted me to move to a centralised isolation building on campus, but I have type 1 diabetes so asked to stay in my room so I could access a fridge. I’m not allowed to leave and have to call the dormitory manager twice a day with my temperature, but the university has been wonderful and provides free meals which are delivered to my door.”
The sudden change in activity levels and a diet that consists almost purely of rice is starting to take a toll on my diabetes management. The isolation paired with the constant high sugar levels has made it difficult, but I understand that it’s essential and I’m grateful for the care I’ve been shown.”
Here’s some reactions from scientists in the UK to the news that British nationals will be evacuated from Wuhan and quarantined for 14 days.
Dr Michael Head, senior research fellow in global health at the University of Southampton, said:
The quarantine will be precautionary. Over 100 tests have been carried out in the UK so far with all of them negative for coronavirus infection. However, this new restriction may reflect the increase in cases in China over the last 24 hours, and ongoing concern about cases coming into the UK and the potential for person-to-person transmission.”
Dr Michael Head, senior research fellow in global health at the University of Southampton, said:
This is a different type of coronavirus, compared with what we saw with Sars, so it will behave a little differently. Here, there have been more cases in China, but so far with a lower death rate than the Sars outbreak.
A pandemic is typically called by the World Health Organization after there has been sustained transmission across many countries. Though there have been cases reported in several countries now, we’re not quite at that stage of sustained transmission yet.
Updated
A British teacher in Shanghai, who asked the Guardian to remain anonymous, is staying in China after he was unable to get a visa for his young daughter.
“We were unable to get out and now airlines are shutting down flights. We are safely back in our apartment and trying to relax and make the best of the situation. We have food to last around two weeks but obviously we are a little concerned.
“We’ve got two small children and with the situation rapidly changing we are becoming more and more isolated. I think this raises many questions about the British government’s policies on family and citizenship. It’s incredibly hard to stay as a family and be mobile internationally if you’re in a ‘mixed citizenship’ family. We will only leave if we can go together.”
Updated
Japan and the US have airlifted hundreds of their citizens from Wuhan, the centre of the coronavirus outbreak, as officials in China said the death toll from the disease had risen sharply overnight to 132, with nearly 1,500 new cases in the country.
A government-chartered plane carrying 206 Japanese nationals arrived in Tokyo from Wuhan on Wednesday morning. Officials said four of the passengers – a woman and three men – had coughs and fevers and had been taken to a hospital in separate ambulances for treatment and further tests.
Two of the four showed symptoms of pneumonia following scans, but a coronavirus diagnosis has not been confirmed, hospital representatives said.
Officials in the US said a chartered plane had landed in Anchorage, Alaska, with about 240 US citizens onboard, including staff from the US consulate in Wuhan.
Photograph: Kerry Tasker/Reuters
More details have come through about the German plans for evacuation and quarantine. The health minister, Jens Spahn, said he expected the federal government to reach an agreement with authorities in the state of Hesse in the next few hours to get an evacuation of German citizens from China under way.
Spahn said Germany wanted to fly out citizens in the province of Hubei as quickly as possible but wanted to ensure the evacuation was well prepared before evacuees were transported to Frankfurt.
“We are therefore in close contact with the Hessian authorities to come to a solution between the federal government and authorities there and I assume that we will succeed in that in the next few hours so that the plane can take off quickly,” he told reporters.
• This entry was amended on 31 January 2020. It previously stated that Frankfurt was the capital of Hesse. This has been removed.
Updated
China watchers have picked up on the way discontent with the authorities is rumbling – and finding an outlet online.
Chenchen Zhang, a lecturer at Queens University Belfast, points out that legal authorities took issue with apparent punitive measures taken against some people for allegedly spreading false information.
That intervention was followed up by a post on Weibo, the Chinese microblogging website, saying the eight people were “criticised and educated” rather than being “punished”. Cue criticism from the public …
Wuhan PSB updated on weibo today saying that the 8 were only 'criticized and educated', not "arrested or punished". 25k angry cmts below the post: "Is it so difficult to apologize"? "It's you who should be criticized & educated"; "Shameless thru and thru". https://t.co/um7pxw36bT https://t.co/Lo0Xze0jph
— Chenchen Zhang (@chenchenzh) January 29, 2020
Updated
The French drugmaker Sanofi has said it is postponing all its events in China and has asked employees to stop all travel to and from Wuhan and Hubei province in China.
The company said it had no plans to repatriate French employees from China over the spread of the new coronavirus.
Updated
Germany’s health ministry has said quarantine plans will be put in place for people returning from China on evacuation flights, according to Reuters. Germany’s health minister says he expects agreement on evacuation within hours.
At least four cases have been confirmed in Germany, making it the second European country to report cases after France.
Lufthansa is waiting before it follows the example of British Airways in suspending flights to China. “We are monitoring the situation very closely,” a Lufthansa spokesman told Deutsche Welle.
All flights to and from China are running on schedule though the airline said it had observed a “slight reluctance to book”.
Updated
Britain’s health secretary, Matt Hancock, is facing questions on social media after maintaining a relatively low profile in the media over the past week.
His tweet about people returning from China being isolated for 14 days prompted a query from Clare Wenham, an assistant professor in global health policy at the London School of Economics, about the legal implications of the government’s policy.
Can you ensure that this quarantine does not impact on these individual's human rights? What measures are put in place to protect these under UK / International Law? (Genuine Question)
— Clare Wenham (@clarewenham) January 29, 2020
Others informed Hancock that the government’s response was “pathetically slow” and criticised “confusing messaging”.
The FT’s Tom Hancock, in China, contrasts the UK policy to that of the US.
Meanwhile the US Center for Disease Control has said its citizens (already en route from Wuhan) will be "evaluated upon arrival... and then monitored for symptoms post-arrival" https://t.co/9AToNqxppY
— Tom Hancock (@hancocktom) January 29, 2020
Updated
Unicef has shipped 6 metric tons of supplies, including respiratory masks and protective suits, to support China’s response to coronavirus outbreak.
“This coronavirus is spreading at a breakneck speed and it is important to put all the necessary resources into halting it,” said Unicef’s executive director Henrietta Fore. “We may not know enough about the virus’s impact on children or how many may be affected, but we do know that close monitoring and prevention are key. Time is not on our side.”
Unicef said it was working closely with the Chinese authorities, including the commerce ministry and the National Health Commission, as well as the World Health Organization (WHO).
Updated
Beijing is normally buzzing with people at this time of year, but fears of a virus outbreak have kept many indoors and at home, AP reports.
Cultural landmarks such as the Great Wall and Forbidden City have closed their doors to visitors, while shopping malls have reduced their operating hours and only a handful of restaurants have remained open for customers.
Updated
British passengers returning from coronavirus-hit Wuhan could be asked to sign a contract before they board the plane saying they agree to being placed in quarantine. Anyone who does not wish to sign could be asked to stay.
It is thought at least 200 British citizens want to return. The Foreign Office admitted it could become more difficult for British nationals in other provinces to leave and advised them to “make decisions based on their own personal circumstances” over whether to evacuate. The British embassy in Beijing warned that transport to get UK citizens out “may happen quickly and with short notice”.
Updated
Kazakhstan is suspending all passenger travel to and from neighbouring China, Reuters reports.
The Kazakh government said on Wednesday that buses to and from China had already been halted, passenger trains will stop on 1 February and all flights will be suspended from 3 February. The government has also suspended issuing visas to Chinese citizens.
Kazakhstan has refused to host the Asian Water Polo Championships next month or serve as a substitute host for the tennis Fed Cup qualifying event that was initially scheduled to take place next week in Dongguan, China.
The former Soviet republic of 19 million has not registered any cases of the new virus.
Updated
The UK health secretary, Matt Hancock, just tweeted that British nationals will be “safely isolated” for 14 days.
We are working hard to get British nationals back from Wuhan.
— Matt Hancock (@MattHancock) January 29, 2020
Public safety is the top priority.
Anyone who returns from Wuhan will be safely isolated for 14 days, with all neccessary medical attention.
Updated
Britons returning from coronavirus-hit Wuhan will be placed in quarantine for 14 days, most likely at a facility on a military base, PA Media reports, citing UK government sources.
Updated
Here’s a a simple explainer on the coronavirus, answering questions on the symptoms caused by the virus, how is it transmitted from person to person, and at what point should someone see a doctor.
Public Health England and the Department of Health and Social Care are advising those who have returned from Wuhan in the last 14 days to stay indoors and avoid contact with other people. Travellers who have returned should call NHS 111 to inform them of their recent travel to the city
Yvonne Doyle, medical director at PHE, said:
Isolating yourself from other people, like you would with other flu viruses, is in step with the best scientific and expert advice on how to stop the coronavirus from spreading.
This means taking simple, common sense steps, such as staying at home and avoiding close contact with other people as much as possible.
Virgin Atlantic will continue to operate its flights between Heathrow and Shanghai, the company said. Passengers are able to rebook or obtain a refund free of charge.
The airline said in a statement: “We continue to monitor the situation regarding coronavirus and will always follow guidance as set out by relevant authorities. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office is advising against all but essential travel to mainland China, excluding Hong Kong.
“For customers who have booked to travel to China, including Hong Kong, and would like to discuss their travel plans further, we would invite them to contact our customer care team via our SMS messaging system, on +44 (0)7481 339184. The team are happy to assist with any inquiries.”
Here’s a report by Guardian reporter Jessica Murray and Michael Standaert on a British family trapped in the centre of the coronavirus outbreak being split up in coronavirus evacuations.
A Chinese national has been confirmed to have novel coronavirus in Queensland, Australia. The 44 year old Chinese national, who is currently stable, but isolated in the Gold Coast University Hospital, is from the city of Wuhan. The relevant authority will be releasing more information at a press conference tomorrow.
Dr Jeannette Young, the chief health officer in Queensland, has said the authorities are closely with the hotel where the Chinese women’s national football team and their support staff are currently staying. the team were in the city of Wuhan on 22 January.
“We are working closely with the hotel and the 32 individuals concerned – who are all well and not showing symptoms – and we have Queensland Heath staff present at the hotel,” Young said. “The hotel is in the process of alerting other guests and staff and making suitable arrangements.”
Young added: “We want to reassure the public, no one else in this hotel, including staff, is at risk.”
The Chinese get creative to beat boredom:
Updated
As the UK government finalises plans to evacuate its citizens from Wuhan, one British man has spoken of his distress at not being able to leave immediately with his Indonesian wife.
Nick House, who lives in the city with his Indonesian wife and two British children, told Sky News: “We would like to be out of here. The man on the other end of the phone said, ‘Yes, you are on the list, but unfortunately your wife probably won’t be able to get on the plane because she doesn’t have a visa at the moment’.
“I won’t leave without my wife, so essentially the government are leaving three British people here for the sake of one seat on a plane.”
Updated
The US, Japan, and Turkey are evacuating their citizens on Wednesday from Wuhan, which is at the epicentre of the new virus outbreak, as health authorities report the number of confirmed cases has jumped to 5,974.
According to a report by AP Media, the Turkish ambassador, Emin Onen, told the broadcaster NTV that Turkey had made the necessary applications to Chinese officials to evacuate 32 citizens, adding that none of them had been diagnosed with the virus.
“We are in touch with all our citizens,” Onen said. “We will bring them back as soon as possible … with a medical or similarly equipped plane. There will be certain quarantine conditions when they land in Turkey.”
Updated
First confirmed case in the Middle East
The United Arab Emirates on Wednesday confirmed the first cases in the Middle East of the new coronavirus. Doctors are treating a family that had just come from a city at the epicentre of the outbreak, AP Media reports.
The UAE’s state-run WAM news agency made the announcement citing the health and prevention ministry, but did not provide details on where the family lived nor where they were receiving treatment.
It also remains unclear how the family left Wuhan and made it to the UAE. China shut down Wuhan’s airport and other transportation in the city last Thursday to stop the spread of the virus. The lockdown has since expanded to include 17 cities with more than 50 million people in all.
Emirati officials are taking “all the necessary precautions in accordance with the scientific recommendations, conditions and standards approved by the World Health Organization”, the ministry said. “The general health condition is not a cause for concern.”
Updated
The UK culture secretary, Baroness Morgan, hopes BA’s decision to suspend all flights to China would give “more impetus” for the government to make plans to evacuate Britons from the region.
Morgan told BBC Breakfast:
The Foreign Office will be working with staff on the ground to identify UK nationals. We will get people home as soon as we can, as soon as we can make arrangements.
Obviously, today’s decision by British Airways provides more impetus to the government to make other plans and communicate those.
The health system is well-prepared. We are not aware of any confirmed cases of the virus here in the UK but we do have the expertise to look after people, to treat and to test should that become necessary.
Updated
The Chinese women’s national football team has been quarantined in Queensland after arriving on Wednesday morning.
The Australian Associated Press reports that the team, who were were in the city of Wuhan on 22 January, will be required to stay at their inner-city hotel until 5 February over fears that members may have the deadly coronavirus.
New restrictions being enforced by the state government require anyone returning from Wuhan to self-isolate for a fortnight after leaving the central Chinese city.
Updated
Britain is finalising plans to evacuate its nationals from the coronavirus-hit Chinese province of Hubei. Flights taking Britons back home could begin as early as Thursday, PA Media reports.
The deadline for those in the city of Wuhan and surrounding areas to contact the British consulate expressing their wish to leave passed at 3am UK time (11am local time).
Flights evacuating Britons could begin as early as Thursday, according to a British teacher in Wuhan city.
British Airways suspends all direct flights to and from mainland China
Morning, I’m Aamna Mohdin taking over the liveblog from my colleague Ben Doherty.
British Airways has suspended all direct flights to and from mainland China, following travel advice from the Foreign Office that warned against all but essential travel to the country due to the coronavirus outbreak.
BA.com, the airline’s website, shows no direct flights to China are available in January and February, Reuters reports.
“We apologise to customers for the inconvenience, but the safety of our customers and crew is always our priority,” BA said in an emailed statement on Wednesday. “Customers due to travel to or from China in the coming days can find more information on BA.com.”
Updated
Indonesia has no cases of coronavirus. But, according to its foreign ministry, 243 Indonesian nationals are in Hubei, about 100 of those in Wuhan. Indonesian students in the city have said they want to get out, but can’t.
“The Indonesian government has to take quick and appropriate measures to ensure the evacuation of Indonesian citizens who are currently in Wuhan,” Golkar party parliamentarian Christina Aryani told the Jakarta Post in a statement.
“Leaving our citizens there is just the same as letting them wait their turn to get infected.”
Updated
As the UK prepares to evacuate its citizens from Wuhan, some of the logistical and bureaucratic challenges of extracting people from a city under lockdown are emerging. One Briton in Wuhan, who did not want to be quoted, told the Guardian:
We have no way to get through roadblocks to the airport. That has to be applied for through London then getting word back for the OK from local government here.
Updated
British Airways suspends bookings of London flights to Beijing and Shanghai
British Airways has suspended bookings on its website for direct flights from London to Beijing and Shanghai until March, after warnings over travel to China due to the coronavirus outbreak.
BA.com, the airline’s website, shows no direct flights to China are available in January and February.
A spokeswoman for the airline said on Wednesday it was “assessing the situation”.
Britain on Tuesday advised against “all but essential” travel to mainland China due to the coronavirus outbreak.
The sixth coronavirus case in Australia has been confirmed by Victoria’s chief officer, Dr Brett Sutton.
The man in his 60s became unwell on 23 January, having recently travelled to Wuhan. He presented to a doctor and was referred to the Monash Medical Centre, where he was tested for the virus.
Sutton said the man had since returned home, where he was in isolation. The man’s family is being monitored. Some have exhibited symptoms, but none has returned a positive test.
Australian health officials have stressed that they have not seen any evidence of human-to-human transmission of the 2019-nCoV novel coronavirus in Australia.
“The man was mostly at home and had isolated himself when unwell but he had gone out to a restaurant called The House of Delight for a short period of time,” Sutton said.
“That restaurant has been followed up with and those who were there at the same time, whose contact details we have, we are following up with.
“But obviously that restaurant is OK to go to now. People don’t need to avoid that area or indeed anywhere else people have been, even if infectious at the time.”
Updated
After a sell-off on Monday and Tuesday, markets in Asia Pacific have bounced back today. The ASX200 benchmark index in Sydney closed 0.5% higher and the Nikkei in Tokyo wound up 0.71% to the good. South Korea, which was battered on Tuesday, was also higher.
Global stocks continue mid-virus rally w/exception of Hong Kong which tanks 2.5% on return from Lunar New Yr holiday. S&P 500 recovered from worst sell-off in 4mths. Pos sentiment driven by Apple holiday sales which topped forecasts. Bonds unch w/US 10y ylds at 1.65%. Gold $1567. pic.twitter.com/OUGZPmHii9
— Holger Zschaepitz (@Schuldensuehner) January 29, 2020
“Stock markets across the Asian region have reclaimed a portion of yesterday’s losses,” Kyle Rodda, at IG Markets in Melbourne, said, “as volatility subsides slightly, on the back of diminishing angst among market participants regarding the coronavirus outbreak.”
“The psychology is simple enough … markets react most aggressively to brand new information. Of course, this isn’t to say this issue will go away any time soon.
“But the initial shock of needing to price in this new coronavirus risk into markets has certainly subsided, with additional information about the matter now having a diminishing impact.”
Updated
The flight carrying 240 American citizens from Wuhan has just landed in Anchorage, Alaska, after a journey of nine-and-a-half hours. Those passengers will now fly on to March Air Force Base in California.
First suspected coronavirus case in Tibet
Tibet, the last place on China’s mainland that had not recorded a case of coronavirus, has now reported its first suspected case. A 34-year-old man who travelled to Tibet by train from Wuhan has been placed in quarantine.
Updated
Sixth coronavirus case confirmed in Australia
A sixth case of coronavirus has been confirmed in Australia. A man in his 60s tested positive Wednesday morning in Melbourne. He had recently travelled to Wuhan. Health officials are monitoring his close contacts. The man’s case is the second in Melbourne, Australia’s second-largest city. The others are in hospitals in Sydney.
Hello, Ben Doherty taking over our rolling coverage of the coronavirus outbreak. It’s early in the UK, but there is news for Britons stuck in Hubei and their families.
The UK is finalising plans to bring back Britons from Hubei province after advising Britons there to ring dedicated 24-hour helplines before 3am UK time on Wednesday to register their desire to be evacuated.
Officials estimate up to 200 citizens currently there will want to return to the UK.
Flights taking Britons back home could begin as early as Thursday, according to a British teacher in Wuhan city who said UK citizens were being given details of forthcoming flights.
On Tuesday evening the Foreign Office updated its advice to warn against all but essential travel to mainland China following the coronavirus outbreak. “If you’re in this area and able to leave, you should do so,” it said.
The UK’s move to evacuate its citizens follows flights chartered by the Japanese government and the US.
The flight to Tokyo landed Wednesday morning, with four on board taken to hospital, while the US-government flight is set to land in Alaska in about 20 minutes from now (a little before 6.30am GMT).
Australia and New Zealand have announced plans for an evacuation mission, quarantining their citizens on the remote Australian territory of Christmas Island.
Other countries, such as France and Indonesia, have also announced their intentions to evacuate their citizens from Hubei.
Germany now has four confirmed cases of coronavirus, the second European country to report cases after France.
Updated
First coronavirus case reported in United Arab Emirates
The first case of coronavirus in the United Arab Emirates – and thus the Middle East region – has been confirmed by state media, according to Reuters.
The state-run news agency WAM announced the case earlier today, citing the UAE health ministry.
According to the report, the person had been in Wuhan, but did not provide any further information.
Education minister Dan Tehan said some schools and states had “gone further” than the official government advice when deciding how to treat children who have returned from China or from overseas.
He said that the official advice, as determined by experts, was still enough and what was recommended.
“We think schools should follow the medical advice. Some schools have decided togo further than that. That is their individual right to be able to do that. Some states have taken a more cautious approach. But our view is we should follow the medical advice provided by our experts here in Australia and internationally.
“We’ve said that we will constantly monitor that advice and provide updates on it on a regular basis. That’s what we’re here doing this afternoon.”
Updated
Health minister Greg Hunt says the government does not intend to use enforcement powers to make people stay at home in quarantine.
He is also asked about the choice of Christmas Island as a quarantine site.
“The choice of the Christmas Island was made on the basis of the ability to establish quickly [and] to provide the capacity to deal with all those who were likely to arrive.
“Secondly, one of the things that is very important is that we have full and absolute protection for Christmas Islanders. I’ll leave the circumstances to home affairs and to foreign affairs”.
As to whether the evacuated Australians from Wuhan could leave the detention centre, he said: “I’ll leave it to home affairs.”
Updated
Surgical mask 'perfectly adequate' for public
He adds that a surgical mask – not a thicker P2 mask – is fine for the general public.
Surgical masks are “perfectly adequate” even for medical assessment of patients, and P2 masks are only needed for those treating confirmed cases.
“The prevailing advice is surgical masks are perfectly adequate for the clinical assessment of a suspected case and their examination.
“Where P2 masks are important is when you’re collecting the diagnostic specimen and anyone collecting the diagnostic specimen is provided with a P2 mask. The GPs are seeing a lot of people who don’t have this disease and they just need some protection and a surgical mask on the patient and a surgical mask on the GP, and all of our expert advice suggests that’s adequate.
“It’s not adequate if you’re [treating a] proven case in hospital who is coughing and we know they have a virus.”
Updated
Murphy says that Australia’s Health Protection Principal Committee (HPPC) is aware of a case, in Germany, where somebody without symptoms transmitted the disease.
However, he said this was rare.
“HPPC still deserves most infections are transmitted by people who have symptomatic disease. That is a very important statement.
“There’s no other real strong evidence of transmission in symptom who is pre-symptomatic but any evidence we need to take action upon.
“We believe that the nature of coronaviruses is they generally are only infectious when symptomatic. That’s what we saw with SARS and MERS. All the evidence from China suggests nearly all of the cases are only infectious when they’re symptomatic.”
Australia recommends quarantine for those who have visited Hubei
Australia’s chief medical officer, Professor Brendan Murphy, has announced that all Australians who have had contact with people with coronavirus, or visited Hubei province, should stay at home and be quarantined for 14 days.
He says this policy is “highly precautionary”.
Health minister Greg Hunt said this was an update to the official advice.
“Contacts of any confirmed coronavirus cases now must be isolated in their home following exposure,” Murphy said. “Returned travellers who have been in the Hubei province of China must also be isolated in their home for 14 days after leaving Hubei province other than of course seeking medical care.
“Given the substantially lower number of cases in China reported outside of Hubei province, we do not currently recommend self-isolation for travellers from other parts of China or from other countries.”
Updated
The Malaysian prime minister, Mahathir Mohamad, has said he is in talks with China to evacuate Malaysians from Wuhan, Reuters reports.
There are 78 Malaysians currently in Wuhan, he said.
Updated
The mayor of Christmas Island – the Australian territory in the Indian Ocean where evacuated Australians will be quarantined – has said the decision will create “a leper colony”.
Prime minister Scott Morrison announced earlier today that Australia and New Zealand were trying to organise an evacuation of citizens in Wuhan. If successful, the people will be taken to Christmas Island and potentially quarantined for 14 days.
Mayor Gordon Thomson told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation this would “create a convict settlement for innocent people. Now we’ll be a leper colony. These ideas were abandoned in the mid-20th century.”
A family of Tamil asylum seekers from the Queensland town of Biloela are also currently on the island.
Priya and Nadesalingam, and their Australian-born children, Kopika and Tharunicaa have been held there since August as they challenge their deportation.
Christmas Island has been the site of an Australian immigration detention centre that was closed in September 2018.
In February 2019, the government announced it would be re-opened, and then closed, to the cost of $185m.
Updated
Papua New Guinea has banned all travellers from entering the country from “Asian ports”, according to Agence France-Presse.
In a note to airlines and boat operators, the ministry of immigration said “all citizens originating from the Asian ports will be refused entry to the country effective today”.
The ministry also announced that Papua New Guinea’s only official land border – with Indonesian-controlled Papua province – would be shut from Thursday.
No cases of coronavirus have been reported in Papua New Guinea, but the country’s health service is already buckling under the weight of underfunding and rampant public health problems.
Papua New Guinea is one of only a handful of countries where polio is still endemic, leaving doctors and the United Nations scrambling to revive long-lapsed vaccination programmes.
Papua New Guinea residents returning from Asian countries will be held in quarantine for 14 days.
“This is a preventative measure taken to ensure the spread of the coronavirus that is rapidly spreading in the world is minimised,” immigration and border security minister Westly Nukundi Nukundj said.
Updated
US flight diverted to air force base
The evacuation flight from Wuhan to the United States has been rerouted to land at a US air force base, rather than an airport.
The plane, carrying 240 Americans, left Wuhan this morning. It was scheduled to land at Ontario international airport in southern California, 56km (35 miles) from Los Angeles.
But Curt Hagman, the chairman of the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors, announced on Twitter it would now be diverted to March Air Force Base, roughly 35 miles east of Ontario.
Breaking News! #SBCounty #CoronaVirus
— Curt Hagman (@curthagman) January 29, 2020
Watch the video below https://t.co/BX8NoJA40D
The flight, operated by American cargo airline Kalitta Air, left Wuhan’s Tianhe airport today at 4.54 in the morning local time.
It will stop at Anchorage in Alaska for refuelling, and then fly on to California. Passengers will be screened for the virus in Anchorage, and could be quarantined in California for up to two weeks by the US Centers for Disease Control.
Ontario had been designed by the US government to receive Americans repatriated in case of an emergency.
“We were prepared, but the state department decided to switch the flight to March Air Force Base,” Hagman said.
Data from publicly available flight tracking site Flightaware shows that the flight will land in Anchorage in one hour.
Updated
In Beijing, Reuters reports that a pharmacist has been fined 3 million yuan (US $434,530) for artificially inflating the price of masks sixfold during the coronavirus outbreak.
An administrative penalty notice has been issued to the Beijing Jimin Kangtai Pharmacy for sharply raising the price of N95 masks, the Beijing municipal market regulator said in a statement on its website.
The store raised the price of a box of 3M brand masks to 850 yuan while the online price was just 143 yuan, state television said.
Since Thursday, the regulator has investigated 31 price violation cases, it said.
In Shanghai, the municipal market regulator has ordered the closure of a drug store that sold sub-standard masks, the city government said. The regulator has asked the store to refund buyers and dispose of unsold ones, it said on its official account on the Weibo app.
Updated
Here’s one of the ambulances carrying a Japanese patient to hospital.
Four taken to hospital in Japan
Four Japanese citizens who were evacuated from Wuhan have been taken to hospital with a cough and fever, according to the Tokyo metropolitan government.
Associated Press reports that the patients are a woman in her 50s and three men whose ages range from their 30s to 50s. They were taken to a Tokyo hospital on separate ambulances for treatment and further medical checks.
206 evacuees arrived on Wednesday morning in Tokyo, after they were airlifted out of Wuhan in Hubei province, the epicentre of the coronavirus outbreak.
Earlier, Japanese officials said that no people on board had the virus.
Passengers on the flight were wearing masks and underwent temperature checks before boarding and while on the plane. Plans were made for all of the evacuees to be treated and quarantined depending on their test results.
Updated
In South Australia seven people are awaiting coronavirus tests, but the department of health says the likelihood of them having the disease is “low”.
Three people who were previously tested came back with the all-clear.
South Australia coronavirus update 29/1/20.
— SA Health (@SAHealth) January 29, 2020
The latest advice is available on the Australian Government Department of Health website: https://t.co/F665xvVTEB pic.twitter.com/FeY4bXWmUp
Updated
In Melbourne, our reporter Else Kennedy has just been to a media conference with Australian researchers who have recreated the novel coronavirus in a lab – the first time this has been done outside China.
The team at Melbourne’s Peter Doherty Institute worked through the night from the early hours of Saturday morning until Monday to grow and sequence the virus.
“This is one step, a piece in the puzzle that we have contributed,” said virus identification laboratory head Dr Julian Druce.
The lab-grown virus was developed from the first infected patient to be identified in Australia, and will be shared with laboratories globally.
“Having the real virus means we now have the ability to actually validate and verify all test methods, and compare their sensitivities and specificities,” Druce said on Wednesday.
The virus is expected to generate an antibody test, which allows detection of the virus in patients who haven’t displayed symptoms.
The institute’s deputy director, Dr Mike Catton, said it would help develop a more realistic picture of how the virus was tracking.
“An antibody test will enable us to retrospectively test suspected patients so we can gather a more accurate picture of how widespread the virus is, and consequently, among other things, the true mortality rate,” Catton said.
Updated
In finance news, the Hong Kong stock market has slumped off the back of coronavirus fears, but the rest of Asia was up.
As of an hour ago (02.30am GMT), the Hang Seng was down 2.6%, but Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 was up 0.5%.
Chinese markets however, are still closed.
Agence France-Presse reports that Hong Kong investors returned from the Lunar New Year break to “a global panic over the deadly coronavirus, though most other Asian markets were lifted by bargain-buying after recent losses”.
“Healthy US data reinforced hopes for the global economic outlook and supported a rally across US and European markets, which provided a strong lead for Asia, while a record earnings report from Apple also helped the mood.
“Among the worst-hit sectors on global trading floors are firms linked to travel and tourism, as big-spending Chinese tourists stay at home with Beijing clamping down on people’s movement.”
In Hong Kong, the airline Cathay Pacific lost more than 3%, casino operator Galaxy Entertainment lost more than 6% and property giant New World Development lost more than 4%.
Updated
Some pictures here of Chinese construction workers building an emergency hospital that is urgently being set up in Wuhan.
The Huoshenshan hospital is scheduled to open on 3 February. Another, the Leishenshan hospital, is being constructed nearby to a similar schedule.
The government is livestreaming the construction of the site.
Updated
Journalist Rebekah Holt has said she has spoken to the Tamil family from Biloela now detained on Christmas Island.
“They have not been told by staff about centre being used for quarantine purposes. My call was the first they knew of it.”
I have just spoken to Priya. She told me they have not been told by staff about centre being used for quarantine purposes. My call was the first they knew of it.
— Rebekah Holt (@rebekahhlt) January 29, 2020
She is worried about her little girls health as both have already been sick while in detention #auspol #coronavirus https://t.co/Q5ifWsA0pv
For some background on the case, read here:
Updated
In Tokyo, passengers from the evacuation from Wuhan have spoken to media.
Takeo Aoyama, who works for Nippon Steel Corp, and Takayuki Kato, who works for Intec, said they felt relieved but also exhausted, Associated Press reports.
Kato said he was “shocked when all transportation systems were suspended. That’s when the situation drastically changed.”
Aoyama said many people who wished to go home to Japan were still in Wuhan, including workers at a Japanese supermarket chain staying open to supply food.
Updated
The news that Christmas Island will be used to potentially quarantine Australians with the coronavirus has led to renewed calls for the government to release a family of Tamil asylum seekers from Biloela currently detained there.
Priya and Nadesalingam, and their Australian-born children, Kopika and Tharunicaa had fled the Sri Lankan civil war, and lived in the Queensland town of Biloela since 2014.
The government moved to deport the family in 2018, and they have been held in detention as a court assesses various legal challenges.
They have been held on the remote Christmas Island – a former immigration detention centre – since August. The petition to bring them Home to Bilo has since received 260,000 signatures.
Today it was updated, in light of the plan to use Christmas Island in the Wuhan evacuation.
“We at the Home to Bilo campaign would like to extend our thoughts to those currently caught in the coronavirus outbreak,” the petition says.
“We understand that Christmas Island will be used as a quarantine area for Australians being evacuated from Wuhan and Hubei province.
“We will be monitoring the situation to ensure that Priya, Nades, Kopika and Tharunicaa are not put at risk during this process.
“We have repeatedly called for Priya, Nades, and their two young daughters to be returned to mainland Australia. Their ongoing detention on Christmas Island has isolated and traumatised this young family. This new development confirms that the most appropriate place for them is in their home, Biloela.”
Updated
Fun fact: Australia has a stockpile of 21.5 million masks; 1 million will now be released to GPs and medical services as the government prepares to evacuate Aussies from Wuhan to Christmas Island quarantine. #auspol #coronavirus #wuhan
— Jason Om (@jason_om) January 29, 2020
Our correspondent Rebecca Ratcliffe has spoken to dual British and American citizen Nick, who is a teacher in Wuhan and who is among up to 200 people waiting to be evacuated.
He called the Foreign and Commonwealth Office crisis line earlier this morning and was asked if he would be prepared to leave his wife behind, because she is Indonesian and doesn’t currently have a UK visa. They have two children, aged nine and 12, also in Wuhan.
“He said that she would probably not be able to get on the plane,” said Nick. “I feel like we are being hung out to dry”.
Other Britons who have Chinese partners fear their wives or husbands will also be unable to get on the plane.
It is not clear how many people will be given a seat on the flight, which is also likely to be carrying consulate staff. Some British people in Wuhan have been receiving calls and told that there will be a flight tomorrow, others are still waiting for news.
Updated
Number of Coronavirus cases in China exceed Sars
AFP reports that the number of confirmed cases of coronavirus in China reached 5,974 on Wednesday, overtaking the number of people infected in the mainland by the Sars epidemic in 2002-3.
There were 5,327 confirmed cases in mainland China during the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome epidemic.
That outbreak killed more than 770 people globally, including 349 in mainland China.
So far
To recap, so far today:
- The official death toll in China has risen to 132, with 5,974 cases confirmed
- 240 American citizens, and 200 Japanese citizens have been airlifted out of Wuhan this morning. The Japanese plane landed in Tokyo two hours ago, with no passengers infected, according to officials. The US plane is scheduled to land in Anchorage, Alaska in 4 hours, and will then fly to Ontario, California.
- Australia and New Zealand will attempt to evacuate their citizens from Wuhan and the Hubei province.
- Australia has told citizens to reconsider travel to the entire country of China.
- Three more people have been infected in Malaysia, taking their total to seven.
- Australian scientists have become the first in the world, outside of China, to replicate the coronavirus in a lab.
Malaysia has confirmed that seven people have the coronovirus, three more than yesterday, according to Reuters.
The three new cases are a 4-year-old girl, a 52-year-old man and the mother of two children confirmed infected earlier, the health ministry said in a statement.
All seven people are Chinese citizens.
Authorities said the mother had initially tested negative and had stayed in Malaysia to take care of her children - grandsons of a 66-year-old man who tested positive in Singapore for the coronavirus last week.
Separately, Malaysia’s communications regulator said it has detained one person accused of spreading fake news on the coronavirus. The person was arrested over a Facebook post that contained false information on the outbreak, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission said.
Malaysia this week imposed a temporary ban on Chinese nationals arriving from Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province.
In that press conference, Australian prime minister Scott Morrison also announced that the government would distribute 1 million masks around Australia.
However, the chief medical officer stressed that the masks are only necessary for people travelling through China, and for doctors and nurses.
“The masks are for patients with the relevant travel history and symptoms and their doctors who are assessing them, we’re not recommending the general Australian public wear masks or take protection,” he said.
The masks are being sent to pharmacists via the Primary Health Networks, Morrison said.
But “bushfire responses have depleted some of those stocks in various places”.
Our correspondent Michael Standaert in Sichuan, writes that there have been no real updates of an evacuation among British citizens in Wuhan.
This comes amidst the US and Japanese airlifts this morning, and the announcement of an attempted Australian evacuation a few minutes ago.
“The biggest problem for everyone now is how to get to the airport. They are supposed to provide their own transport and that’s nearly impossible for some since there are no taxis, no ride hailing available, no buses.”
The prime minister is asked whether he has been briefed on the virus’s potential economic impact on Australia.
“We share a concern, particularly in the wake of the bushfire crisis, of the impact on our tourism industry and related things. And that is obviously of concern to us.
“But to be honest, right now, my focus is on people’s health and their wellbeing. And these issues will be addressed in time when a clearer picture emerges.”
Morrison says that parents should follow the advice of NSW Health and the chief medical officer when it comes to sending kids to school.
“My kids went back to school this week as many other kids have.
“I understand the issues and concerns that parents would have. Being one of them myself. And that is why it is important to take the advice, and I think the chief medical officer today has set out the situation very soundly.”
Morrison is asked if he can estimate how many people could be evacuated. He says it is too early to know.
“At this stage we are simply saying that we are putting plans in place.”
New Zealand “has a much smaller number of people impacted than Australia”, he says.
He says some of the Australians in Wuhan may have lived there for some time.
“There are some people who will be there for some time and effectively have been living there for some period of time. We are talking about [evacuating] people who are there not in those circumstances, those who don’t have support structures in that place.”
Foreign minister Payne is asked how long it will take for the Chinese government to approve an evacuation.
“We must be prepared to be patient as this process is undertaken. Australia is not the only country seeking diplomatic support and clearances for these activities. But we are seeking permission from the Chinese authorities as I indicated in my opening remarks.”
Updated
There are 600 Australians in Hubei province who have reached out either for advice or assistance, foreign minister Marise Payne says.
The focus of the evacuation is on “isolated and vulnerable Australian citizens”, she says.
That means the young and the elderly, Morrison said earlier.
Australia’s chief medical officer, Professor Brendan Murphy, is now speaking.
He stresses that “there is no evidence of human to human transmission in Australia”.
“We have tested a large number of Australians with a relevant travel history and relevant symptoms and a great majority of those have been negative,” he says.
“All of the 5 cases in Australia are in a stable condition. The World Health Organisation have estimated that only 20% of people with this condition have a severe disease.
“The majority of people have a mild disease and still most of the deaths are in people who are older and the Chinese are reporting them to have comorbidity...And we want to stress that there is no evidence of human to human transmission in Australia”
“The risk is extremely low”.
The potential evacuation will be conducted in partnership with New Zealand, Morrison says. “I spoke again to Prime Minister Ardern today.”
Qantas has offered to provide the evacuation flight.
On Christmas Island, the medical checks, and potential quarantine will be conducted by Ausmat (Australian Medical Assistance Teams). The defence force will also be deployed.
“I also want to stress that for Christmas Island, we will be ensuring there will be support provided directly to the Christmas Island community completely separate and quarantined from the support that is being provided in the quarantine zone,” Morrison says.
"Assisted departures" organised for Australians in Wuhan
Australia has upgraded its travel advice to reconsider all travel to China – and will be providing “assisted departures” to elderly and young Australians in Wuhan and Hubei province.
Prime minister Scott Morrison has described the coronavirus as “a serious and evolving situation” in a press conference in Canberra.
“The travel advice has been upgraded to reconsider all travel to China – the entire nation,” he says.
“We have taken a decision this morning to prepare a plan for an operation to provide some assisted departures for isolated and vulnerable Australians in Wuhan and the Hubei province.”
The evacuated Australians will then be quarantined in Christmas Island for up to 14 days.
But that is not for certain, and dependant on the medical advice.
“We cannot give a guarantee that this operation is able to succeed,” he says. “And I also want to stress very clearly that we may not be in a position if we’re able to do this on one occasion to do it on another occasion.”
Updated
The Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, is now providing an update on the virus, speaking in Canberra.
And more detail on that flight. According to public flight tracker FlightRadar24, the plane left Wuhan at 4:47 in the morning local time, and landed at Tokyo Haneda airport at 8:41 in the morning, Tokyo time – which was roughly one hour ago.
Japanese airlift lands with no passengers infected – officials
A chartered plane carrying about 200 Japanese nationals evacuated from Wuhan arrived in Tokyo on Wednesday morning, according to Japanese media reports.
The passengers, who were examined by four medical professionals during the flight, will be asked to stay at home for two weeks and be on the lookout for symptoms, Kyodo news agency said.
The Japanese foreign ministry, however, said none of the passengers was infected with the coronavirus, according to Kyodo.
A total of about 650 Japanese have asked to be evacuated from Wuhan. A second charter flight bound for Wuhan is expected to leave Tokyo on Wednesday evening, with additional flights to follow. The first plane arrived in Wuhan on Tuesday night carrying emergency relief supplies including 15,000 masks, 50,000 pairs of gloves and 8,000 protective glasses, the foreign ministry said.
The death toll in mainland China has now risen to 132 – per official health commission figures.
Australian scientists create virus in lab
This morning Australian scientists have become the first in the world, outside of China, to replicate the coronavirus in a lab – in what they hope could lead to a vaccine.
Researchers at Melbourne’s Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity recreated the virus from an infected patient.
It will be shared with expert laboratories working closely with the World Health Organisation in Europe, along with laboratories across Australia.
It will also help assess the effectiveness of trial vaccines.
Chinese officials had released the genome sequence of the novel coronavirus which first surfaced in its Hubei province in December.
Australian chief medical officer Professor Brendan Murphy said the creation of the live virus was significant, particularly for providing controls for tests and speeding up an antibody test.
“It’s a very significant development and it’s very, very positive,” he told ABC Radio.
Five people are being treated in Australian hospitals for the virus, with four of those cases in NSW alone.
Death toll rises to 131 in China
The death toll in China has now risen to 131 people, according to the updated coronavirus tracker from Tencent News.
There are now also 5515 confirmed cases and 6973 suspected cases.
Japanese citizens to be airlifted from Wuhan
And, as the US airlift out of Wuhan continues, Japan today has confirmed it too will evacuate 200 of its citizens.
According to the Kyodo news agency, a chartered plane has departed the city early this morning, and is scheduled to arrive at Tokyo’s Haneda airport.
In total, around 650 Japanese nationals have requested an airlift out of Wuhan.
“We’ll continue to take every possible measure to bring home all people hoping to come back to Japan,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told lawmakers on Tuesday, according to Jiji Press.
Officials are aboard the plane to monitor passengers during the return flight, but there are no plans to isolate those arriving from Wuhan.
The European Union will fly its citizens out aboard two French planes this week, and South Korea was due to do the same. Several other countries were assessing their options.
Canada said 126 of its citizens live in the Wuhan area and it is consulting with allies and considering its options for getting them home.
US airlift leaves Wuhan
Hello and welcome to our continuing coverage of the novel coronavirus originating from Wuhan in China.
This morning, the US has begun its first evacuation of citizens from Wuhan itself, in the Hubei province, where thousands of people have been affected.
The US state department confirmed to the Associated Press that 240 Americans – including diplomats and other citizens – have been airlifted out of the city, and will be flown to Anchorage in Alaska, and then to Ontario in California, 56 kilometres (35 miles) from Los Angeles.
Data from publicly available flight tracking site Flightaware shows that a flight operated by American cargo airline Kalitta Air left Wuhan’s Tianhe airport today at 4.54 in the morning local time, and is due to touch down in Alaska in 6 hours from now.
According to AP, all Americans will be screened for the virus in Anchorage, and could be quarantined in Ontario for up to two weeks by the US Centers for Disease Control.
David Wert, a spokesman for the county of San Bernardino, said they were “preparing for that eventuality just in case”.
Wert said that Ontario International Airport was designated a decade ago by the U.S. government to receive repatriated Americans in case of an emergency overseas. Airport personnel have trained for such an occasion but the repatriation from China would be the first time the airport is used for this purpose, he said.
In Ontario, the area where passengers will be taken is removed from passenger terminals and other public areas at the airport, the county said.
Updated
