The death toll in China's coronavirus rose sharply to 425 with 64 deaths on Monday and the number of those infected with the deadly disease rose to 20,438, Chinese health authorities said on Tuesday.
The commission added that 11,977 patients remained in severe condition, and 5,248 people were suspected of being infected with the virus, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
A top United States senator has unveiled an 18-point plan, including enhancing military ties with India, to hold the Chinese government accountable for its "lies, deception, and cover-ups" that ultimately led to the global COVID-19 pandemic.
China's national health commission said 39,452 new cases were reported on Monday, including 36,304 local asymptomatic cases, as authorities scrambled to contain the fresh surge in infections.
India on Wednesday reported 21 cases of the JN.1 Covid variant, a development that is neither surprising nor particularly worrying, scientists said while allaying fears but also advising adherence to existing precautionary measures.
The total deaths from the more than two-month-old outbreak as reported on Thursday stood at 1,367, with the total number of confirmed cases mounting to 59,804, health officials were quoted as saying by the state-run Xinhua news agency.
The reality is, the worldwide toll could have been checked within time if China had been more transparent and had warned countries regarding the new strain of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS)-like infection, which originated at a 'wet market' in its province of Hubei late last year.
The US is learnt to have asked Israel to sever ties with China, especially in areas with security risks.
Three researchers from the Wuhan Institute of Virology sought hospital care in November 2019, weeks before Beijing disclosed the COVID-19 pandemic, a United States media report said, citing a previously undisclosed American intelligence document that could add weight to growing calls for a full scale probe of whether the coronavirus may have escaped from China's top bio lab.
The US president in the last several weeks has been very critical of China's inability to control the spread of the novel coronavirus within its territory. By Thursday more than 94,000 Americans have died due to the coronavirus and over 1.6 million have tested positive.
That's why he is now finally focusing on the two things that alone can help: Fiscal expansion -- from December onwards -- and supply management via amended laws and rules that affect business, notes T C A Srinivasa-Raghavan
China was also slammed by the panel for "lost opportunities to apply basic public health measures at the earliest opportunity."
'At its peak, COVID-19 in Korea felt like half-disaster, half-disaster movie.'
'India's acts of goodwill fully demonstrate its friendship with China'
As many as five plagues have come out of China in the last 20 years and at some point it has to stop, United States National Security Advisor Robert O'Brien has said, holding the country responsible for the origin of the coronavirus pandemic which has killed over 250,000 people globally.
China has smothered most outbreaks within its borders, keeping new case numbers low.
China will carry out major scientific research to enhance its biosecurity science and technological capacity against future infectious diseases, state-run Global Times quoted Xiang as saying.
Trump has repeatedly blamed China for the coronavirus pandemic which originated in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year and accused Beijing of suppressing the details of the contagion.
While Wuhan and 17 others cities in Hubei province remained the epicentre of the viral disease outbreak with most of the deaths having taken place there, the cases have started rising steadily in most of the Chinese provinces and cities, including Beijing.
With flowers pinned to their chests, Xi and other Chinese leaders paid a silent tribute in front of the national flag to the victims of the COVID-19, which is regarded as the worst public health disaster in China's history.
The US is the worst-hit nation with 211,793 deaths and 7,549,429 infections.
The grant will be in addition to the $20 million provided by China, the world's second largest economy, earlier to the WHO.
The head of the World Health Organisation said on Saturday that the UN health agency would send an international mission to China as it received a response from Beijing.
The "unknown pneumonia in Kazakhstan caused 1,772 deaths in the first six months of the year, including 628 people in June alone", the Chinese embassy in the central Asian country said in a statement.
If the precautions are not taken and guidelines are not followed properly, there can be chances of spike in cases, the government said.
The Chinese Super League (CSL) looks set to start its new season at the end of June or in early July and will not have to shorten the campaign, Guangzhou R&F CEO Huang Shenghua said. The CSL was originally scheduled to kick off on February 22 but was pushed back due to the coronavirus pandemic, which has infected more than 2.33 million and killed about 160,000 people globally.
The Chinese health authorities announced on Wednesday that 5,974 confirmed cases of pneumonia caused by the novel coronavirus had been reported in 31 provincial-level regions by the end of Tuesday.
The NHC said, 78 new confirmed COVID-19 cases were reported on the Chinese mainland on Monday, of which 74 were imported from abroad taking the number of overseas cases to 427.
"The intelligence community and the rest of the government are still looking at this. There's not been a definitive conclusion, so it's difficult for me to say, nor should I feel like I should have to defend press reporting about a possible preliminary indication here," National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby told reporters at a daily White House news conference.
The Indian Embassy in China has also operationalised two helplines which are open to respond to any concerns of Indians in that country as the death toll due to the virus has risen to 56.
'Viral infections rise in winter and better care needs to be taken in the next few months.'
Over 20,000 passengers returning from mainland China and Hong Kong underwent thermal screenings at the seven international airports of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Cochin
Around 71 people were trapped in the hotel that collapsed on Saturday in Quanzhou city of the province. The hotel was used to quarantine and observe people who had come to the province during the novel coronavirus prevention and control and had come in contact with the virus patients.
'Alongside economic growth and the Asian century, stress has become an Asian caravan.' 'But stress doesn't arrive in one's country as invitation to taste exhaustion. It comes dressed as a challenge.' 'Its evangelists ask: Are you man enough to shoulder stress?' points out Shyam G Menon.
In a tweet, India's Ambassador to China, Vikram Misri said the medical kits were dispatched early on Thursday from Guangzhou Airport in southern China. Over two million test kits being procured from China will be sent to India in the next 15 days, Misri told PTI in Beijing.
China has imposed strict quarantine measures for all those returning from other countries.
Trump also said his administration will stop at nothing to save lives and shield the vulnerable.
'By causing military humiliation of India it intends to send a signal to other Asian countries to toe the Chinese line,' argues Colonel Anil A Athale (retd).
'Post the pandemic, when India is turning a new leaf in its economic policy with an eye on foreign capital and global supply chains that are likely to leave China, heightened tensions on the India-China border creates an atmosphere of uncertainty,' observes Virendra Kapoor.
As of Friday, the total confirmed cases on the mainland were 82,875. As many as 77,685 patients have been recovered, the NHC said.
