WUHAN: China sealed off millions more people near the epicentre of a virus outbreak on Friday (Jan 24), shutting down public transport in an eighth city in an unprecedented quarantine effort as the death toll climbed to 26. The virus that emerged in the central city of Wuhan has now infected 830 people, the national health commission said. In stark contrast, a hospital visited by journalists bustled as worried patients came in to get checked for the virus. "This is an emergency in China, but it has not yet become a global health emergency," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters after two days of talks in Geneva. China also on Friday confirmed the second virus death outside the Wuhan epicentre, saying a patient died in Heilongjiang province, 2,000 kilometres (1,200 miles) northeast of Wuhan.

Source: The Star January 24, 2020 06:56 UTC