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The Chinese city at the center of the coronavirus epidemic has closed the first of 16 specially built hospitals, hurriedly put up to treat people with the virus, after it discharged its last recovered patients, state broadcaster CCTV said on Monday.

News of the closure coincided with a sharp fall in new cases in Hubei province and its capital of Wuhan but China remained on alert for people returning home with the virus from other countries where it has spread.

“The rapid rising trend of virus cases in Wuhan has been controlled,” Mi Feng, a spokesman for China’s National Health Commission told a briefing.

“Outbreaks in Hubei outside of Wuhan are curbed and provinces outside of Hubei are showing a positive trend.”

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As the new coronavirus spread rapidly in central China, the country’s authoritarian government took a very authoritarian step: It ordered the unprecedented lockdown of 60 million people in the hardest-hit province.

The shutdown of public transport in some cities, the closing of entertainment venues nationwide and a heavy dose of fear emptied the streets of the world’s most populous nation.

Now that the virus has reached every continent except Antarctica, with South America's first confirmed case this week, the World Health Organization is proposing a challenge for others: Be more like China.

Simply put, if a disease isn’t truly understood and there are no medicines or vaccines for it, then quarantine is the most effective way to curb its spread. And acting fast is crucial, as China learned, after its initial tepid response.

The question before the world is to what extent it can and wants to replicate China’s draconian methods.

“Few other countries have the ability to implement a lockdown at that scale,” said Dr. Raina Macintyre, a global biosecurity expert at the University of New South Wales in Australia.

In a democracy, a restriction of this magnitude "requires explaining a lot, why it is important,” said virologist Marion Koopmans of the Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands. “But it is a common-sense thing that people can understand. Our grandparents taught us so. I remember being in human quarantine as a child, when I had mumps.”

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The question before the world is to what extent it can and wants to replicate China’s draconian methods

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Originally posted by Nina:
I'm not sure we can trust China's data.

You're welcome.

quote:

Originally posted by Nina:
I'm not sure we can trust China's data.

You're welcome.

quote:

Originally posted by Nina:
I'm not sure we can trust China's data.

You're welcome.