Coronavirus: Taiwan reports its first death of outbreak
- Island says fatality was a 60-year-old unlicensed taxi driver with chronic health problems
- WHO chief again praises China, saying its actions bought the world time, but says ‘we don’t know how much time’
The numbers, for Saturday, included 139 deaths – the same as for the previous day – in Hubei province, the epicentre of the outbreak. The central province also accounted for 1,843 of the newly confirmed cases, with 1,548 of those in the provincial capital of Wuhan, where the outbreak was believed to have started at a seafood and meat market in December.
Hubei’s new infections – down from the previous day, when it reported 2,420 – took its total to 56,249, with 1,596 deaths. The province had on Thursday begun including cases identified by clinical diagnosis, having previously counted only positive results from test kits, which have been in short supply.
Mi Feng, a spokesman for China’s National Health Commission, told a press conference in Beijing that measures taken to control the spread of the coronavirus had shown clear results. He said the proportion of infected people who were seriously ill had dropped significantly in Wuhan, Hubei and the country as a whole.
Taiwan reports first death
A 60-year-old man who had a chronic disease died of complications from pneumonia and septicaemia on Saturday, becoming Taiwan’s first death from the coronavirus, Taiwanese Health Minister Chen Shih-chung said.
“The man had not travelled abroad. Because Singapore has reported quite a few examples of coronavirus with no travel history we decided to check if he was infected and found he tested positive for the virus,” Chen said.
He said the man had worked as an unlicensed taxi driver, and his passengers were mostly from mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau.
Chen said the quarantine and health authorities immediately traced people he had contacted, including his family and the medical personnel who treated him.