This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/jan/26/china-bans-long-distance-buses-from-entering-three-cities-to-contain-coronavirus-spread

The article has changed 8 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 1 Version 2
Coronavirus: China bans inter-city buses from Beijing as lockdown intensifies Coronavirus's ability to spread getting stronger, China suggests
(about 3 hours later)
Shandong province and the capital, Tianjin and Xi’an have suspended inter-city and chartered buses from crossing their borders Officials announce new measures to contain disease, including wildlife trade ban and bus suspensions
Chinese authorities have stepped up their attempts to contain the spread of the coronavirus outbreak as one province and three cities – including Beijing – banned long-distance buses. Restrictions to halt the outbreak of the new coronavirus in China will be intensified, the country’s health commission minister has said, warning that the virus’s ability to spread appeared to be getting stronger.
As the United States, France and Australia prepared to evacuate their citizens from Wuhan, the quarantined city at the outbreak’s epicentre, drastic measures were being put in place to prevent China’s population of 1.4 billion from moving around the country. “The transmissibility shows signs of increasing and the ‘walking source of infection’ [where patients have few signs of disease] has made it difficult to control and prevent the disease,” said Ma Xiaowei.
The eastern Shandong province, with a population of 100 million people, will suspend long-distance buses entering the province, state broadcaster CCTV reported, following the announcement of similar measures in the cities of Tianjin, Beijing and the historic Xi’an. “For this new coronavirus we have not identified the source of the infection and we are not clear about the risk of its mutation and how it spreads. Since this is a new coronavirus there might be some changes in the coming days and weeks, and the danger it poses to people of different ages is also changing.”
Inter-city buses in the province will only be allowed to leave if stations have temperature screening measures, CCTV said. Officials announced a range of measures on Sunday, including a nationwide ban on trading in wildlife, and the suspension of long-distance buses in the eastern province of Shandong, which has a population of 100 million people. Long-distance buses have also been banned from departing from or arriving at Beijing and Shanghai.
From 6pm (1000 GMT) on Sunday, Xi’an – home to the Terracotta Army – will suspend long-distance buses and tourist chartered buses entering the city of 10 million people, local officials said on the Twitter-like Weibo platform, following the announcement of similar measures in Tianjin and Beijing. The death toll from the outbreak rose to 56 by Sunday afternoon, when health officials told reporters that knowledge of the virus was quite limited and that experts were still not clear about its source. Almost 2,000 have been infected, according to official figures.
Inter-city taxis will be suspended, except those from the city’s airport, the statement said. Authorities believe the new strain of coronavirus came from a seafood market in Wuhan, the centre of the outbreak, where wildlife was sold illegally. The city remains under a strict lockdown, while various travel restrictions have been imposed across at least 20 other cities, affecting tens of millions of people.
The measures are to stop the spread of the virus through “passenger transport by road and taxis”, officials said. The disease has so far spread to more than 10 other countries, including France, the US and Australia. Those countries are also preparing to evacuate their citizens from Wuhan.
Shantou in the southern province of Guangzhou – 800km from Wuhan – said on Sunday it was also banning cars, boats or people from entering the city, except for emergency purposes. But this statement was later reversed with local state media STRTV saying that it would only strengthen disease controls such as disinfection efforts. In Beijing, officials said that the reopening of schools and universities after the new year holiday had been indefinitely suspended.
China has locked down the hard-hit province of Hubei in the country’s centre and the capital Wuhan in an unprecedented operation affecting tens of millions of people to slow the spread of a respiratory illness that president Xi Jinping said posed a “grave” threat. There are concerns that screening efforts may not identify all people who carry the disease. An article published in the Lancet, based on a family who had recently visited Wuhan, suggested it was possible to have the Wuhan virus while not experiencing any symptoms. It is not clear whether patients who are asymptomatic can also transmit the disease.
The virus has spread throughout China and around the world, with cases confirmed in around a dozen other countries as distant as France, Australia and the United States. The incubation period for the virus could range from one day to two weeks, Ma said, but experts remained unclear about the risk of the virus mutating and said it was possible that the number of infections would continue to grow.
The State Department said on Sunday it was arranging a flight to evacuate staff at its consulate in Wuhan as well as other American citizens trapped in the city. Health teams are working urgently to determine the origin of the disease. It is from the same family of viruses as Sars, which was passed to humans from bats by masked palm civets, and Mers, which was carried from bats to humans by camels.
The flight departs Wuhan on Tuesday for San Francisco, it said in an email to Americans in China, while warning of “extremely limited” capacity for private citizens. A new nationwide ban on the sale of wildlife will affect markets, restaurants and online shops. Health experts have long raised concerns about unhygienic and cramped conditions in some Chinese markets, where wild and often poached animals are packed together.
France’s government and the French carmaker PSA - which has a sizable presence in Wuhan - also said they were formulating plans to evacuate staff and relatives, who would be taken to a city in a neighbouring province to face a quarantine period. In Wuhan, where most cases have been concentrated, the streets remained deserted on Sunday, with rules keeping most private cars off the roads. Relatives who would usually have spent the new year holiday together were forced to cancel plans and stay in their separate homes.
Sri Lanka said its embassy in Beijing also was considering action regarding its own nationals. Some residents told the Guardian they were remaining calm and believed the quarantine measures were the only way to halt the virus. Others, however, expressed concern about how vulnerable people would be affected by the lockdown.
The streets of stricken Wuhan were even more deserted on Sunday after new restrictions went into effect banning most cars from roads in the metropolis of 11 million. “Each time the government issues different measures, it is a rough approach, and they are the ones who cause panic. I couldn’t sleep at night when they announced to close the city and I was in shock,” said Miss Huang, 22, from Wuhan, who added that the local government’s failure to act quickly had created distrust.
A woman said she and fellow staff at a Wuhan hotel were living in the hotel itself as a precaution amid the transport freeze. Elsewhere, Disneyland in semi-autonomous Hong Kong announced on Sunday it had closed following the government’s declaration of an emergency to combat the crisis.
“The hotel is letting us live in it for our safety because if we go out we are afraid of being infected,” said the woman, who declined to give her name. The financial hub of Shanghai, which has extensive international air connections, on Sunday reported its first death: that of an 88-year-old man who already had health problems.
But residents interviewed by AFP generally took the hardship in stride.
“I have a lot of confidence. I believe the Wuhan city government can defeat this (epidemic),” said a man who gave only his surname, Wan.
Travel is also being curtailed in other parts of the country, with long-distance bus services entering and leaving Beijing suspended Sunday. The neighbouring northern city of Tianjin plans to follow suit Monday.
Overseas Chinese tour groups will be suspended from Monday while domestic trips have already been halted since Friday.
In the semi-autonomous southern city of Hong Kong, Disneyland announced Sunday it had closed following the government’s declaration of an emergency to combat the crisis.
The nationwide death toll rose to 56 after 15 new deaths, most of them in Hubei.
The financial hub of Shanghai, which has extensive international air connections, on Sunday reported its first death - an 88-year-old man who had pre-existing health problems.