The toll of the coronavirus epidemic exceeded 2,000 deaths on Wednesday, but the WHO warned against any disproportionate measure, citing a study showing that more than 80% of patients suffered from a mild form of the disease.
A China-European Union summit scheduled for late March in Beijing has also been abandoned . The number of contaminations in mainland China reached 74,185 on Wednesday, 1,749 more than the previous day, the smallest increase in a month. Elsewhere in the world, around 900 infected people have been identified in around thirty countries. The World Health Organization (WHO) is reassuring: outside of central Hubei province, epicenter of the epidemic, the disease "affects a very small proportion of the population", with a mortality rate of around 2 %.
For the past few weeks, China has de facto quarantined almost all of Hubei. Outside the province, only 56 new cases were identified on Wednesday in the last 24 hours. On February 4, there were still 890.
In total, the death toll in mainland China has now reached 2,004 dead. Among them, a director of hospital died Tuesday in Wuhan, cradle of the coronavirus. Elsewhere in the world, five deaths have been recorded so far (in the Philippines, Hong Kong, Japan, Taiwan and France), but the epidemic still gives rise to many fears. A China-European Union summit scheduled for late March in Beijing has also been abandoned, according to European sources.