Beijing, Europe Brief News – Chinese authorities decided to ban daily figures for COVID-19 cases and deaths.
This came as hospitals in China appear to be filling up amid concerns about a fresh Covid-19 wave hitting the country.
Cities across China are struggling with surging virus cases, resulting in pharmacy shelves stripped bare and overflowing hospitals and crematoriums, after Beijing suddenly dismantled its zero-COVID regime earlier this month.
Beijing last week admitted the scale of the outbreak has become “impossible” to track following the end of mandatory mass testing.
Since 2020, China has imposed strict health restrictions as part of its zero Covid policy.
But, the government ended most of those measures two weeks ago after landmark protests against the strict controls.
The number of cases has since soared, raising fears of a high mortality rate among the elderly, who are particularly vulnerable.
Despite the rise, the official figures show only five people died from Covid on Tuesday and two on Monday.
It has led to WHO emergencies chief Dr Ryan urging China to provide more information about the latest spread of the virus.
He said: “In China, what’s been reported is relatively low numbers of cases in ICUs, but anecdotally ICUs are filling up.
“We’ve been saying this for weeks that this highly infectious virus was always going to be very hard to stop completely, with just public health and social measures.”
