According to data released recently, there has been an increase in Corona virus cases in China, and 300 people have died within 24 hours. This increase continues to affect the economy negatively.
The Chinese Corona virus, officially known as Covid-19, had a jump in Wuhan the other day. The number of deaths in the country increased around 300 within 24 hours, and the number of reported infections increased from 45,000 to 60,200. This number is expected to increase by a few thousand more during the weekend and it seems difficult for people to return to work on Monday.
Most of the cases due to travel restrictions in the country cannot go beyond Hubei. The only positive thing that can be said at this point was that the medics in Hubei, the epicenter of the epidemic, changed the criteria for what caused a new infection. According to a health official’s statement, the number of clinically diagnosed cases will now be included in the number of confirmed cases so that patients can be treated on time.
Covid-19 brings along economic troubles:
According to Alicia Garcia-Herrero, Asia-Pacific’s chief economist, analysis has stopped predicting virus-related stability, and even the Chinese media marks the earliest April. Earlier expectations had expected the number of new cases to fall to lower levels until Friday.
Although Covid-19 is an epidemic that puts people’s health at risk, it is also a bad economic crisis. At this point, Hubei, which has travel restrictions, makes up about 4% of China’s GDP. In addition, Hong Kong closed its borders with the mainland. Russia and other countries are taking similar measures. On the other hand, a workforce that is too high to be underestimated is afraid of the infection and cannot return to work.
Meanwhile, the Chinese government has announced some financial measures so that small businesses can access $ 171 billion in financial support. However, insurance companies are asked to make $ 14.3 billion worth of purchases from Chinese stocks and keep A-stocks alive during the crisis. The secondary effect of the epidemic negatively affects supply chains in sectors such as automotive and computer hardware components.
According to the data, the outbreak cannot go beyond Hubei:
Although the outbreak affects many sectors negatively, the number of infected people is quite low outside of Hubei province. According to Johns Hopkins University data, Beijing, which is a giant city of approximately 21 million, has only 366 cases and 3 death reports. On the other hand, there are 315 known cases in Shanghai with a population of 24 million and only one person died. The situation is similar in Shenzen, one of the financial centers of China.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Protection, only 37.4 million and 42.9 million people had flu in the past winter. The number of those who died from the flu was approximately 36,000 to 61,000.
Although no treatment method has been developed for the outbreak until now, it seems to be under control, since the vast majority of infection cases remain limited to Hubei. It took SARS 8 months to leave the system. If the government can protect it this way and it looks like Covid-19, we can say that China will fight the new epidemic until August.