Recreate virus Coronavirus: Australian scientists first to recreate virus
as
the corona virus continues to spread across China other nations around the
world are starting to increase their precautions just a short while ago British
Airways said it was suspending all flights to and from mainland China that
comes after the British government advised against all but essential travel to
China and Indonesia's Lyon air has also just said it's suspending its flights
other airlines including United Airlines Air Canada and Cafe Pacific Airways
have canceled some flights to China although in some cases it is because of a
lack of demand his travel journalist Simon Calder flights went out normally to
Beijing to Shanghai yesterday they are now on their way back the flight from
Beijing do you in at three o'clock at Heathrow this afternoon the flight from
Shanghai slightly behind it they're both over Siberia at the moment they will
have all the normal passengers who were booked on those flights but they will
also have crucially the crew who flew out yesterday and everybody else who was
booked on flights from tomorrow onwards from Beijing and Shanghai will now be
trying to find alternative routes well the official figures from China show how
the virus is continuing to spread the number of confirmed fatalities rose by26
to 132as of Wednesday morning almost all of those deaths are in Hubei
Province where
the virus was first discovered and there was also a sharp increase in the number
of confirmed infections up by almost a third to standard just under six
thousand well here's what the Chinese officials had to say at a news conference
in Beijing just a short time ago we are now in the critical period of the
prevention of this epidemic we need to control the potential source of Pyro’s
yes recently we do have people travel from Hubei to function area and in other
communities we also have the similar travelers from Wuhan and also
we actually
have the registration and management of those people who travel from khan or
from the Hubei province and ask them to stay at home for the 14 days quarantine
let's go live now to Robinbronty's in Shanghai Robin welcome to you with the
authorities calling this now the critical stage what's your assessment of how
they view this crisis as being at well on the one hand we have country that
certainly around Wuhan the epicenter City and the surrounding province of Hubei
essentially a lockdown involving millions of millions of people on the other
hand we have international governments seeking to
remove their people from that
city at the same time airline companies restricting some of them going even
further and completely suspending flights in and out of the country they say
that's because they need to protect their passengers and their staff but also
as I think you’ve alluded to obviously the demand for seats on flights now given
the change in advice in the use the change in the Ukase going to absolutely
plummet President Jinxing yesterday the man who has said he is in charge of directing
personally the response to this described this outbreak of coronaviruses a
devil they are throwing everything they have at it in terms of logistics
something of course by the nature of the authoritarian communist party control
government here they can do very well thousands of military personnel doctors
huge amount of money being sent in to try and assist as well but at the same
time the effort is to try and stop the spread and just contain this virus and
the most effective way of doing that in recent days has essentially been to tell
everyone not to return to work not to return to school they've postponed the
end of China's Lunar New Year Festival that’s because the prospect of tens of
millions of people Crises crossing the country over the coming days and this
what they could do for spreading the diseases frankly just adds to the
nightmare scenario okay Robin brown in Shanghai for now thank you well the race
is on to find a way of immunizing people from the virus and there has been a
development in Australia scientists have been able to replicate it in the
laboratory here’s the team who did it on what that might mean yeah it all feeds
into the global health response and the public view fora Public Health
Initiative and it's really important component that because no viruses appeared
to come out of China yet and it appears that other people have had difficulty growing
but I guess when we provide the virus to others who will bring their expertise toot
it will mean that if you like the cycle time on what they can do will be shortened
well Australia has also announced that it will quarantine suspected cases on
Christmas Island which is better known for being the place which houses
migrants while their claims to stay in Australia are assessed let's go live now
to Sydney and our correspondent ShimerKhalil Shimmer welcome to you what’s
reaction they have been to these people being quarantined on Christmas Island
well I think the initial reaction was one of relief that people are being
evacuated and brought back to Australia but really the choice of Christmas
Island has raised eyebrows and raised number of questions as he mentioned there
Samantha Christmas Island has quite a tainted history if you will since 2003
it's been used as a detention Centre a place where asylum seekers are kept and
detained
it is famous for recently reopened particular detention center that
has recently been criticized for bad conditions for human rights violations
it's currently housing Astra Lankan family of four this detention center is
going to be quarantine zone if you will and upon hearing that many have raised
the question of why is it that600 Australians including a hundred children that
travelled with their families to celebrate the lunar year instead of being
brought to hospitals in mainland China why are they being brought to Christmas
Island about 2,000kilometres from the mainland's actually closer to Indonesia
than it is to Australia mainland the other thing is is if it's a place that's
been criticized for bad conditions in the past why is it suddenly deemed okay
for people to be there to be quarantined for 14 days is there going to be
adequate adequate guard guards adequate medical facilities all of these are
questions that the Prime Minister has not answered and also inside Christmas
Island themselves we’ve heard from the authorities who've told local media that
the first they heard about it from was from the media when the Prime Minister
announced it so in principle there is a sense of relief that Australians and
are coming back butte place that they're going to go to when they do come back
is quite problematic
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