ANALYSIS
This is a question that remains unanswered: has China underestimated the number of people dead from the coronavirus in its country? And for good reason, it has less than 5,000 deaths, a very low figure compared to other countries hard hit by the epidemic such as Italy whose toll today exceeded 10,000 deaths or even France where the coronavirus caused 2,314 victims, according to the latest figures, Saturday.
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For Patrick Berche, professor emeritus of microbiology and former director of the Pasteur Institute, it is very likely that China has reduced the mortality caused by Covid-19. "There was a mortality announced by the Chinese which, in my opinion, was certainly underestimated. It is very hard to believe that in this country, even with containment measures, have so few deaths," explains he at the microphone of Patrick Cohen on Europe 1, specifying that testimonies confirmed the hypothesis according to which the country would have minimized the number of deaths.
"Africa and India will pay a very heavy price"
"Nothing could prevent its dissemination from the Chinese bus, when we see what happened in Wuhan: it is a city of 15 million inhabitants and several million of them left before the confinement So the virus has spread all over China. At the time, we had very strong airborne communications between Europe and China and between China and the United States, "he noted.
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And if that explains the fact that Europe is hard hit by the virus, it also highlights its weaker presence, for the moment, in Africa and India which have less relations with China. However, Patrick Berche is not optimistic. The professor is concerned that the two will be hit hard in the future. "We are facing a pandemic which has spread very quickly and we must fear what will happen in India and in Africa which will pay a very heavy price", he worries, recalling that at the time the Spanish flu, China, Africa and India had the heaviest human toll.