‘I have had to ask the US to save me’: British dual national stuck in coronavirus-hit Wuhan will be airlifted to safety by America today after UK government abandons him in ‘ghost town’ – as Japan, South Korea and France also announce rescue plans

• Ex-pat Ian Thompson being rescued by US because British government has made no efforts to contact him
• Other stranded Brits said they felt as though they were ‘trapped in a zombie film’ in ‘ghost town’ Wuhan city  
• As France and the US carry out rescue plans already, Boris Johnson condemned for being slow to the crisis
• Foreign Office sets up 24/7 helpline for expats stuck in Hubei: +86 (0) 10 8529 6600/(+44) (0)207 008 1500
• Do you have a story about coronavirus? Email [email protected] or ring 020 361 51181

A British dual national trapped in the Chinese city at the heart of the coronavirus outbreak has revealed he is being airlifted to safety by the US because the UK government has abandoned him. 

Ian Thompson told Good Morning Britain that he would stranded if it hadn’t been for his dual citizenship, saying he is not aware of any attempts by the UK to lift some 300 British ex-pats stuck in Wuhan, described as a ‘ghost town’ for its empty streets.

He’ll be flown out of Wuhan on a California-bound chartered plane later today along with hundreds of Americans and is expected to be held in quarantine for a number of days when they land to stop the disease spreading on US soil.

As well as the US, Japan, South Korea, France and Spain have all announced similar rescue plans – but the dithering British government said it was still thrashing options with Chinese officials to get the stranded ex-pats home ‘within the next few days’.  

While it waits for a green-light to commence the repatriation, the Foreign Office has created a 24-hour helpline for anyone stuck in Hubei province – which is now entirely on lockdown as part of a desperate attempt to contain the SARS-like infection by trapping tens of millions of people. 

Graham Hubbard is one of a group of three British scientists confined to their hotel rooms in Wuhan. He said the Foreign Office’s advice had been ‘confusing’ and came too late for them to plan their own escape. 

Other UK nationals stuck in the disease-ridden city have blasted the British government’s failure to arrange evacuations, saying they feel as though they are ‘trapped in a Zombie film’. 

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said the UK was struggling to work out how many ex-pats were in Wuhan, and how many wanted to return home. But questions have been raised about why this has taken so long when many other countries have managed it already.

Mr Shapps BBC Breakfast: ‘For anybody who is there, one of the issues we have, working with our partners internationally on this, is actually identifying how many British citizens there are in Wuhan.

‘We don’t have a list of people in the region so we keep on putting the message out. One of the things we’re asking people to do is to contact the consulate there to make them aware. People have started to do that. We are working on arrangements as well.

He added: ‘If they actually contact the consulate where they are then that consulate is in fact gathering together all the information of the people who are there, in order to help repatriate where that’s appropriate.’ 

In other developments: 

• Germany, Sri Lanka and Cambodia last night became the latest countries to declare cases of Wuhan coronavirus, taking the total to 18 nations including the US, Australia, Canada and France
• The disease is now confirmed to have infected at least 4,500 people around the world and to have killed 106 in China since the outbreak a month ago
• The US, Japan, South Korea, Spain and France have all planned charter flights to pull their citizens out of Wuhan later this week – as the British government was blasted for being too slow to react
• A new report written by the University of Toronto has said the ‘best case scenario’ is that the outbreak dies down after summer this year – meaning another 25,000 cases if the infection continues to spread at the same rate
• The prediction comes as other researchers say they are at least two months away from trialing a vaccine against the virus. By that time, hundreds more could have died and numerous other countries been infected. 
• British boarding schools have been advised to be alert to the prospect of Chinese students being racially abused due to the outbreak of the virus, which experts suspect may have come from bats or snakes
• Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry has accused Mr Johnson of ‘not doing whatever it takes to protect our citizens from harm’, demanding the Government gets the evacuation ‘sorted now’ 

Dual national Ian Thompson told Good Morning Britain that he would ‘stuck here’ if it hadn’t been for his US nationality, saying he is not aware of any attempts by the UK to lift some 300 British ex-pats stranded in Wuhan, described it as a ‘ghost town’ for its empty streets

Graham Hubbard is one of a group of three British scientists confined to their hotel rooms in Wuhan. He blasted the Foreign Office for its ‘confusing’ advice, which came too late for them to plan their own escape

The killer coronavirus outbreak has now killed 106 people and struck down more than 4,500. Cases have been spotted in Canada, US, France and Australia

The US is sending a chartered plane to Wuhan to take Americans stranded in the coronavirus-hit city to Alaska, before another plane diverts them to Ontario City in California

Thai Airways employees are pictured disinfecting an empty plane cabin at Suvarnabhumi International Airport in Bangkok today, January 28. Thailand has 14 confirmed coronavirus cases – the most outside of China

Passengers arriving at Nanjing Railway Station in China have their temperatures checked by staff who are looking to see if anyone has a high fever, a sign of infection

Experts say the difficulty of containing the coronavirus is that so many patients have mild, cold-like symptoms and don’t realise they have the infection

WHAT ARE OTHER COUNTRIES DOING TO EVACUATE EXPATS? 

British ex-pats and tourists stuck in Wuhan have begged officials to ‘get us out of here’, venting their frustrations at the Government’s response so far.

About 300 Britons who live in the city are growing increasingly anxious after the number of virus cases continues to soar.

They accused the UK of dithering as it emerged the US, France, Spain and Japan had already organised evacuations for its citizens.

France

France’s health minister Agnes Buzyn said officials will put ‘hundreds’ of citizens on a direct flight to the country later in the week. She said authorities were working on arranging a bus service to get the expats to the airport.

There are some 800 French citizens stranded in the Wuhan area. She said French nationals will be held in quarantine for two weeks on arrival to stop the virus spreading on home soil. 

The US

The US State Department is organising a single flight out of Wuhan on Tuesday to San Francisco. It said in the event there are not enough seats, priority will be given to to individuals ‘at greater risk from coronavirus’ – those already showing symptoms.

Officials invited US citizens with a valid passport to contact the embassy in Beijing. Private citizens are expected to later repay the travel costs, the notice said. There are roughly 1,000 Americans living in and around the Wuhan area.

Japan

Japan said it planned to evacuate all of its citizens using chartered flights on Wednesday. It claimed it was in final discussions about the logistics with Chinese authorities. Some 430 Japanese nationals reside in or near Wuhan.

The government is also considering evacuation by road from Hubei Province, and have Japanese nationals take flights home from other places, according to Japanese media.

Spain

Spain’s foreign minister Arancha Gonzalez tweeted this morning that Spanish official are trying to evacuate 20 Spaniards stranded in Hubei province. She did not provide further details.

Thailand

The government is meeting today to discuss how to evacuate the 70 known expats living in Wuhan, most of whom are students. Air force commander ACM Manat Wongwat said that up to four planes with medical staff are on stand-by to evacuate its citizens in the coming days.

Sri Lanka 

Officials have applied for a chartered plane to be allowed to land at Wuhan airport and pick up 32 Sri Lankan students and their family members stranded in the outbreak’s epicentre. 

Its foreign office also said it was working to bring back all other citizens living in the wider Hubei province.   There are about 860 Sri Lankan students are in China. 

Australia

Foreign Minister Marise Payne said her government is ‘exploring all opportunities’ to help with evacuation of a number of Australians reportedly in Wuhan. There are thought to be a small number of citizens living in the central Chinese city.

India 

India has asked China if it can make arrangements for its expats to leave. It is not clear how and when India plans to evacuate its citizens if approval is granted. Around 250 Indians are still in Wuhan. 

In his interview with Good Morning Britain today, the British-American dual national Ian Thompson said he was heading to the airport later today.

He added: ‘I have to go through two sets of testing. I have to go through the testing once I arrive at the airport through the Chinese authorities, and once I’ve bypassed that one I have to go and be checked by US officials before I board the plane.’ 

When quizzed about whether the UK had reached out to him he said: ‘There’s been no official attempts so far, as I’ve been aware or been told.

‘It’s extremely strange, and very scary too. The streets are completely empty, there’s no-one walking around. Everyone’s been told to stay in their houses – there’s no transportation anywhere. All the restaurants, bars and everything are all closed down.

‘If I move from my province to another province area in Wuhan I will automatically get held by police and put into quarantine for 14 days.’

Scientist Graham Hubbard, 39, from Wantage, Oxfordshire, was on a working trip with colleagues when the Chinese authorities blocked transport in and out of Wuhan.

His scheduled return flight home was due to take off an hour and a half after the city-wide quarantine came into force last Thursday.

Mr Hubbard and his colleagues, Richard Staunton-Lambert, 49, also from Wantage, and Victoria Sullivan, from Bracknell, Berkshire, are staying at the five-star Renaissance hotel.

He told The Times: ‘We are trapped in our hotel rooms, surrounded by a ghost town with no idea when we can go home to our families and no practical help from our own government, who are giving us contradictory advice.’

The initial advice from the Foreign Office was to stay put and not leave the city until after the travel ban was lifted. But at that time UK officials were not aware of the scale of the outbreak, Mr Hubbard said.

He added: ‘By then it was too late for us to do anything, the flights and trains were cancelled and we were trapped.

‘When I spoke with the Foreign Office today I was told “we can not guarantee anything”. It is very frustrating because we have been given contradictory advice.

‘The Foreign Office website was finally updated at 9am UK time. So nothing happens all weekend until they get back to work on Monday.’ 

Mr Hubbard had been woken up by his panicked wife at the crack of dawn last Thursday who told him about the travel restrictions.

He tried to catch the high-speed train to a city three hours away to fly via a different airport, but was refused a ticket.

The father then hired a taxi but the roads were so congested that by the time he got to the outskirts of the city roadblocks had been put up. 

Bosses in Wuhan have banned the use of cars, meaning the motorways and streets are eerily quiet. The hotel where the British scientists are staying have banned communal eating in the dining room because of the increasing risk of new infections.

Guests can collect takeaway meals to eat in their own rooms or order room service. Mr Hubbard’s wife Laura, 39, who is at home with their three children aged four, six and eight, had begged for the British government to help. 

Ministers have come under immense criticism after Japan said it would send a chartered flight to Wuhan on Tuesday night to evacuate its citizens, while the US government is also preparing an airlift this evening.  Both South Korea, France and Spain are also aiming to fly out citizens this week. 

The American flight will pick up 240 US citizens in Wuhan and make the 11-hour journey to Anchorage, Alaska, where it will stop over before transporting them to Ontario in California. 

It comes after furious Brits hit out at Health Secretary Matt Hancock and told him it’s a ‘bit f****** late’ to tell travellers from Wuhan to ‘self-isolate’ amid fears the killer coronavirus is spreading between people even if they do not show any symptoms.  

In a desperate attempt to prevent an outbreak on British soil, Mr Hancock begged travellers to stay indoors, avoid contact with anyone and ring NHS 111 if they have any symptoms. Officials are still desperately trying to hunt down the 1,500 people who are in the UK after landing from Wuhan in the past fortnight.

Britons have asked if Mr Hancock’s ‘madness’ is the Government’s way of admitting they have no idea who has arrived in the UK from Wuhan, with one even urging the Health Secretary – who was last week told by politicians to ‘pull his finger out’,  to ‘do the job we pay him to do’.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has insisted the Government is doing ‘everything we can’ to evacuate the hundreds of Britons stuck in the deserted Chinese city, revealing ministers are working with their counterparts in the US to draw up a rescue mission amid claims that China is blocking an emergency airlift operation.  

UK officials are confirming plans and waiting for permission from Beijing before carrying out the unprecedented repatriation attempt. Senior Foreign Office sources have admitted that keeping Brits in Wuhan ‘could prove to be a death sentence’, given the escalating outbreak which has struck almost 5,000 people.  

France and the US have already confirmed plans to whisk residents back home, while British ministers have been accused of ‘dragging their feet’. In hope of quashing growing frustration among outraged ex-pats stuck in Wuhan, Mr Johnson said more details will be announced in ‘due course’. He also announced all arrivals from coronavirus-hit parts of China will be screened upon arrival at UK airports.

In the meantime, health chiefs revealed 73 people in the UK have already been tested for the never-before-seen virus – but all cases have so far come back as negative. Public Health England admitted that the first UK confirmed case is likely to come from somebody already in the country.

Ex-pats stuck in Wuhan – capital of Hubei province – have begged officials to ‘get us out of here’ as the outbreak continues to sweep China. One furious Brit said: ‘It’s an utter p***take that we’re being left here like this.’ Politicians backed their calls on Monday, demanding the Government does ‘whatever it takes’ to bring them home.    

In a significant ramping up of the precautions in the UK around the virus, Mr Hancock told MPs in the House of Commons on Monday evening: ‘Coronaviruses do not usually spread if people don’t have symptoms – but we cannot be 100 per cent certain. 

‘From today, we are therefore asking anyone in the UK who has returned from Wuhan in the last 14 days to self-isolate. Stay indoors and avoid contact with other people – and to contact NHS 111. If you are in Northern Ireland, you should phone your GP. 

‘If you develop respiratory symptoms within 14 days of travel to the area, and are now in the UK, call your GP or ring 111 informing them of your symptoms and your recent travel to the city. Do not leave your home until you have been given advice by a clinician.’

Officials have not clarified exactly how patients will be taken to hospital if they complain of symptoms – but it is thought they will be taken in an ambulance and whisked straight off to be isolated while doctors run tests. 

More than 2,000 people are thought to have jetted into Britain from Wuhan since cases first emerged last month. Mr Hancock’s advice applies to anyone who has entered Britain since January 10.  

Mr Hancock, who said there are four centres stood up and ready should there be a need – two in London, one in Liverpool and one in Newcastle, added: ‘Having eliminated those who we know have since left the country, there are 1,460 people we are seeking to locate.’ 

Officials estimate that up to 200 UK citizens currently in Wuhan will want to return to the UK. If these Britons are flown home by the Foreign Office, health officials will also tell them to ‘self-isolate’ for 14 days. 

Mr Hancock added: ‘The Foreign Office is rapidly advancing measures to bring UK nationals back from Hubei Province. I have asked my officials to ensure there are appropriate measures in place upon arrival to look after them and protect the public. If you are in Hubei Province and wish to leave, please get in contact with the Foreign Office.’ 

The above picture shared by China’s National Microbiology Data Center shows the first-ever specimen of the novel coronavirus, known as ‘2019-nCov’, extracted from a patient

The sample, with a serial number ‘NPRC 2020.00001’, was extracted from a patient on January 6, according to China’s National Microbiology Data Center. It is the first 2019-nCov specimen

BRITISH TEACHER WHO LIVED NEXT TO THE SCANDAL-HIT SEAFOOD MARKET IN WUHAN FEARS HE IS SPREADING CORONAVIRUS IN THE UK

A British teacher who spent the last decade in Wuhan fears he may be spreading coronavirus throughout the UK after being turned away for tests by NHS 111.

David Marland, 34, lived just five minutes from the seafood market thought to be at the centre of the outbreak and walked through it nearly every day.

At least one person in his apartment block has tested positive for the deadly illness that has killed 81 people in less than a month.

Mr Marland, from Buckinghamshire, called the NHS helpline as soon as he stepped off a plan at Gatwick Airport from Dubai, via Hong Kong and the Chinese city of Shenzhen, last week. 

He expected to be hauled in immediately for tests, but was only asked if he had ‘the sniffles’. Mr Marland was told to only call back if he began to feel unwell. 

That was despite the recent discovery that patients can be infectious without showing any symptoms. 

When asked about the repatriation operation on Monday, Mr Johnson insisted plans are being worked on to help UK citizens in Wuhan and assured ‘we are doing everything’ to screen people arriving from affected regions.

In an interview at the King’s College London Mathematics School after launching a post-Brexit visa plan, the PM was asked for detail on how frustrated citizens would be assisted.

He replied: ‘We are looking at everything we can to give reassurance to those people in Wuhan and you will be hearing a bit more in due course but I don’t want to pre-empt the decisions we are going to make.

‘Obviously, we are doing everything we can to ensure that people who do come to this country are properly screened and checked if they have come from an area that is known to have the infection. So far there is still no case of somebody with coronavirus here the UK but clearly there are a lot of cases in China and it is spreading.’ 

When asked about the repatriation operation this morning, Mr Johnson’s official spokesman said: ‘The Foreign Office are in close contact with international partners, including the US and European countries, to investigate possible solutions.’

But politicians this week hit back at the lack of news regarding any potential plans – the Foreign Office is waiting to hear how many ex-pats want to return to the UK before it plans any rescue mission.

Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry told the Evening Standard: ‘Boris Johnson is now failing in the first duty of any government — he is not doing whatever it takes to protect our citizens from harm. They need to get this evacuation sorted now.’

Ed Davey, acting leader of the Liberal Democrats, told MailOnline: ‘Over the weekend I called on the Government to get a grip, look after British citizens properly and prepare to evacuate them from Wuhan, so it is extremely disappointing that ministers are still dragging their feet.’ 

Former Foreign and Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme the government will ‘undoubtedly be looking at’ an airlift, but admitted there will be ‘a lot of logistical issues’. 

Security guards stand beside a disaster relief tent in Hunan province, near the border of Hubei where Wuhan is the capital. Photographed today, January 28

Traffic queues at a checkpoint outside the city of Yueyang in the Hunan province where police and government staff check travellers for illness

Children in Cambodia, which confirmed its first case of coronavirus yesterday, are now wearing face masks at school to stop the virus spreading. Schools in China are still closed

WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF A BRITISH PATIENT CATCHES THE VIRUS? 

Are there any treatments for coronavirus? 

Experts have stressed many people with coronavirus will make a full recovery, although some people – both young and old – are being badly affected.

At the moment, there is no specific antiviral treatment recommended for this strain of coronavirus infection. 

Patients in England with the virus will be transferred to one of four High Consequences Infectious Diseases (HCID) units in Liverpool, London or Newcastle.  

The units have specific areas where staff can change in and out of protective clothing and equipment, while patient isolation rooms have tightly controlled air flow and filtering. 

In severe cases of infection, treatment can include life support such as the use of a ventilator, dialysis to support the kidneys and artificial hydration or nutrition.  

What advice is being given to the NHS?  

Doctors in the UK have been told to leave the room straight away and shut their patient in if they think they might have the Chinese coronavirus. They should close the door and wash their hands thoroughly.

PHE guidance, issued to GPs, says: ‘Avoid physical examination of a suspected case. The patient should remain in the room with the door closed. Belongings and waste should remain in the room.

‘Advise others not to enter the room. If a clinical history still needs to be obtained or completed, do this by telephone. The patient should not be allowed to use communal toilet facilities.

‘Instruct them to not touch anything or anyone when walking to the toilet. Instruct the patient to wash their hands thoroughly after toileting.’ 

If the patient is critically ill, they should be put into an ambulance, Public Health England said. But otherwise, a hospital should be phoned ahead and warned and the patient must be told to get there without using public transport or a taxi. 

Hospitals have also been urged by PHE to check their equipment, supplies and procedures. This includes checking they have respirators that staff can wear if dealing with a patient in isolation. 

They should also stock protective clothing such as gloves with long tight-fitting cuffs, disposable and fluid-resistant full-sleeve gowns and single-use goggles. Plenty of clinical waste bags, hand hygiene supplies and chlorine-based disinfectant solutions should also be in stock.

The Foreign Office claims to be on the same page as the US and other international allies, who have confirmed they will sort out a flight to take residents home.

It comes after Professor Yvonne Doyle, medical director and director of health protection for PHE, said the first UK case is likely to come from somebody already in the country – but she said that ‘we’ve been here before’ by preventing the spread of MERS and SARS, adding ‘we are ready’ to cope with any potential cases.

In an interview with Sky News, she said: ‘Our view is that, although airports are important, the most likely place that we might find a case is somebody in the country already, and it’s absolutely critical that the public health service and the NHS are ready to diagnose that and are able to designate the person to the right facilities. That’s the most likely scenario we are dealing with.’

Professor Doyle said efforts were continuing to trace the 2,000 people who have entered the UK from Wuhan on international flights over the past few weeks. But she added: ‘It’s not always possible to find everybody but we are working to our best endeavours.’ 

The Times reported Britain’s plan to whisk residents out of Wuhan was being hampered by Beijing. It is thought that anyone flying back to the country would have to be quarantined to prevent the potential spread of the virus – France has already announced a similar plan.

Mr Hunt said he would be ‘very sympathetic’, when asked if he supported flying Britons back from Wuhan. He added that it would be ‘very, very challenging for the NHS’ if cases were to crop up in the UK but accepted that doctors and nurses ‘will do exactly what they need to’.

The Foreign Office has confirmed it is working on making an ‘option available’ for British nationals to leave Wuhan in the Hubei province in China, saying the ‘safety and security of British nationals is always our primary concern’. No further details about the plan have been given – but it has told anyone stuck in the Hubei province can call a 24-hour helpline.  

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab ordered officials to examine the exact logistics for an airlift out of Wuhan, it was reported yesterday, Although a source said ‘a number of things need to fall into place on the Chinese side before we can make any firm promises’. 

A senior Government source said: ‘It is a fast-moving situation and it requires some tough calls to be made. But the situation is now so bad locally, and the medical system so overstretched, that it could prove to be a death sentence. We need to get people out.’

Demand for action from expats trapped in Wuhan grew louder when China’s own President Xi Jinping admitted his country was facing a ‘grave situation’. Cases of the never-before-seen virus in China have now been confirmed in every province of the country except Tibet. 

Two of the expats stranded in the outbreak’s epicentre spoke on This Morning on Monday, saying they are riddled with anxiety as the coronavirus death toll continues to climb. British PE teacher Kharn Lambert, 31, and his visiting 81-year-old grandmother Veronica Theobald have not been outside for a week.

The pensioner, from Lancaster, is too frightened to go out because her debilitating lung condition – chronic obstructive pulmonary disease – means that she may not survive a bout of the deadly coronavirus. ‘She needs about 18 different medicines each day and, if she caught this virus, I’m afraid it would kill her,’ Mr Lambert, 31, said last night.

Mrs Theobald arrived in Wuhan in early December and was due to return to the UK tomorrow but her flight was one of those cancelled when the city was effectively closed off to the world on Thursday. She has just a week’s supply of her vital drugs left.

As Mr Lambert and his grandmother waited anxiously, elsewhere in the city yesterday British expats were exchanging angry messages on social media about the apparent intransigence of the Foreign Office in response to their pleas to ‘get us out of here’.

Other British ex-pats living in Wuhan – home to 11million people – have described the eerie scenes on the streets of a usually bustling city. But the city is reportedly standing together to fight the outbreak, with locals chanting ‘Wuhanjiayou’ – which roughly translates as ‘Wuhan, keep going’.

Chris Hill, a foreign language coach originally from Washington in Tyne and Wear, told the PA news agency he had seen scenes of ‘panic and chaos’ akin to something ‘you would see in a movie’ when shopping at a supermarket in the early stages of the outbreak.

Matthew Heard, a 31-year-old education consultant from London who has lived in Wuhan for the past five years, told The Guardian that the best word to sum up the situation in the city at the moment is ‘confusion’.

Men in face masks stand guard at the Infectious Diseases Hospital in Colombo, Sri Lanka – the country declared its first coronavirus case yesterday

A China Eastern check-in desk at Incheon International Airport in South Korea is pictured deserted today, January 28. Normally, the Lunar New Year period sees millions of people travel around the Far East to visit family

Many roads in China are being closely monitored – if not closed – by the authorities to stop people transporting the coronavirus around the country. Pictured today, January 28, a man is screened by officials at a checkpoint at the city of Yueyang, Hunan

Coronavirus: What we know so far 

What is this virus?

The virus has been identified as a new type of coronavirus. Coronaviruses are a large family of pathogens, most of which cause mild respiratory infections such as the common cold.

But coronaviruses can also be deadly. SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, is caused by a coronavirus and killed hundreds of people in China and Hong Kong in the early 2000s.

Can it kill?

Yes. Eighty-one people have so far died after testing positive for the virus. 

What are the symptoms?

Its symptoms are typically a fever, cough and trouble breathing, but some patients have developed pneumonia, a potentially life-threatening infection that causes inflammation of the small air sacs in the lungs. People carrying the novel coronavirus may only have mild symptoms, such as a sore throat. They may assume they have a common cold and not seek medical attention, experts fear.

How is it detected?

The virus’s genetic sequencing was released by scientists in China to the rest of the world to enable other countries to quickly diagnose potential new cases. This helps other countries respond quickly to disease outbreaks.

To contain the virus, airports are detecting infected people with temperature checks. But as with every virus, it has an incubation period, meaning detection is not always possible because symptoms have not appeared yet.

How did it start and spread?

The first cases identified were among people connected to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan.

Cases have since been identified elsewhere which could have been spread through human-to-human transmission.

What are countries doing to prevent the spread?

Countries in Asia have stepped up airport surveillance. They include Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia and Philippines.

Australia and the US are also screening patients for a high temperature, and the UK announced it will screen passengers returning from Wuhan.

Is it similar to anything we’ve ever seen before?

Experts have compared it to the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). The epidemic started in southern China and killed more than 700 people in mainland China, Hong Kong and elsewhere

SCROLL DOWN TO SEE MAILONLINE’S FULL Q&A ON THE CORONAVIRUS 

He said: ‘There’s a lot of information flying around. There’s posts flying around group chats and no one really knows what’s going on. That’s the main frustration.

‘I’ve been holed up for the last maybe three days. On the first day I started out to the supermarket and got a good few things to keep m tied over for the foreseeable eight or nine days, but I’m going to consider perhaps going out again. 

‘I know a few others who are venturing out most days just to go to the shops or to the supermarket to see if they can restock on supplies and things.’

Fifty-two UK patients have already been tested for coronavirus. NHS staff have also been briefed on how to handle corpses infected with the lethal Chinese virus after it was revealed it had spread to three locations in France over the weekend. 

The dossier published by Public Health England warns that the virus – which has stricken two in Paris and another in Bordeaux – is ‘accelerating’. Five cases of the unnamed coronavirus have now been recorded in both the US and Australia, and Canada announced its first case over the weekend.

PHE’s document obtained by The Sunday Times advises: ‘The act of moving a recently deceased patient onto a hospital trolley for transportation to the mortuary might be sufficient to expel small amounts of air from the lungs and thereby present a minor risk.

‘A body bag should be used for transferring the body and those handling the body at this point should use full PPE [personal protective equipment].’ Furthermore, medics meeting any potentially infected people should wear ‘full-face visors’, while GPs should avoid contact with patients and place them into immediate quarantine.

Despite the strict guidance to try to contain the virus, one British teacher who has spent the last decade in Wuhan fears he may be spreading the virus throughout the UK because he claims he was given the wrong advice by an NHS 111 operator.

David Marland lived just five minutes from the seafood market thought to be at the centre of the outbreak in Wuhan. He told The Telegraph that he called the helpline as soon as he stepped off a plan at Gatwick Airport from Dubai, via Hong Kong and the Chinese city of Shenzhen, last week.

But instead of being hauled in for tests in isolation, the 34-year-old alleges that he was only asked if he had the ‘sniffles’ and to only call back if he began to feel unwell – even though it has since been revealed that patients can be infectious without showing any symptoms.

Mr Marland, from Buckinghamshire, said: ‘I’m potentially a risk to other people. I’m still within the two-week period so I could be spreading the disease everywhere without having any symptoms… Maybe I should be staying away from people, but no one has told me to. They haven’t given me any advice at all. I’m just getting on with my life – what else am I supposed to do?’ 

He accused the NHS operator of just ‘ticking boxes’ and ‘leaving the door open’ to the killer virus. But NHS sources told The Telegraph that the operator had correctly followed advice – which comes from Public Health England and says to ring if you ‘develop a fever, difficulty breathing or a cough’.

TWO BRITISH EXPATS STUCK IN WUHAN SAY THEY HAVEN’T GONE OUTSIDE IN A WEEK 

Two of the expats stranded in the outbreak’s epicentre spoke on This Morning, saying they were riddled with anxiety as the coronavirus death toll continues to climb.

British PE teacher Kharn Lambert, 31, and his visiting 81-year-old grandmother Veronica Theobald have not went outside for a week.

The pensioner, from Lancaster, is too frightened to go out because her debilitating lung condition – chronic obstructive pulmonary disease – means that she may not survive a bout of the deadly coronavirus.

‘She needs about 18 different medicines each day and, if she caught this virus, I’m afraid it would kill her,’ Mr Lambert, 31, said last night.

Mrs Theobald arrived in Wuhan in early December and was due to return to the UK tomorrow but her flight was one of those cancelled when the city was effectively closed off to the world on Thursday. She has just a week’s supply of her vital drugs left.

As Mr Lambert and his grandmother waited anxiously, elsewhere in the city yesterday British expats were exchanging angry messages on social media about the apparent intransigence of the Foreign Office in response to their pleas to ‘get us out of here’.

All of the UK patients who have already been tested for the virus have been found to be negative. But a Public Health England boss last week warned it was ‘highly likely’ the never-before-seen virus will eventually come to the UK, as the infection continues to rampage across China. 

Home Secretary Priti Patel yesterday revealed the Government was ‘looking at all options’ to help Britons leave Wuhan. Foreign Office officials have reportedly prepared a charter flight for around 200 British citizens and diplomats trapped in Wuhan, where 11million are on lock-down.   

Scientists fear China’s status as a major superpower may have influenced the World Health Organisation’s decision not to declare the coronavirus outbreak as being an international emergency last week, with the UN-body saying it was ‘too early’ for such a decision.  

Baffled experts warned the decision may have been influenced by China. Yanzhong Huang, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, told The Daily Telegraph: ‘The criteria for declaring a public health emergency of international concern have been met.’ But ‘not all WHO decisions are made based on the developments in the biological world,’ he added. 

It came after a top Chinese health official said that the new virus was becoming more contagious than SARS –from the same family of coronaviruses which killed nearly 650 people across Beijing and Hong Kong in 2003. 

Dr Yvonne Griffiths, 71, from Cardiff, has been posted in Wuhan for three weeks with two colleagues from Birmingham City University. The university had arranged for the English language lecturer and her colleagues to fly back on Monday but there have been no updates on when the airport will re-open.

‘Although there’s been so much in the media about the virus and about the risk of students travelling back and forwards from the UK, there doesn’t seem to be anything about stranded individuals like ourselves,’ Dr Griffiths told the BBC.

‘And it seems maybe the British government has a lack of either concern or lack of planning in place, I’m not sure. I think there’s a lot of uncertainty – that’s what’s frustrating at the moment as much as disappointing.’  

Nurses in India are pictured wearing protective gear as the country is on high alert for potential coronavirus cases – none have been diagnosed there yet

A subway station in Seoul, South Korea, is disinfected by masked workers. More than half a million people in the country have petitioned for visitors from China to be turned away at the border

HOW WOULD BRITAIN EVACUATE EXPATS? 

The Foreign Office told MailOnline it is trying to work out how many of the estimated 300 expats stuck in Wuhan want to return to the UK.

It said once it has an idea of how many citizens to come home, it will start planning a way to evacuate them.

The Government would not say how it planned to do this, but it thought that a chartered plane would bring them home.

The Foreign Office would need permission from Chinese officials to fly from Wuhan – or a nearby airport – because there is currently travel ban in the region.

Britain may have to pay Chinese officials to pave the way for the evacuation. There is precedent for this – the Government paid Libya during the civil war in 2011 to allow citizens and diplomats to return. 

The UK may also set up a special bus service to pick up UK nationals in the central Chinese city and take them to the airport – something France has already announced it is doing.

Once British expats touch back down on UK soil, they will need to be tested and kept in quarantine for a period of time to stop the virus spreading.

The Government told MailOnline it ‘wasn’t prepared to go into the specifics’ at this time.

But France has announced it will keep its citizens in quarantine for two weeks once they return.

Her daughter Bethan Webber said she and her mother were struggling to sleep with the stress of the situation. Dr Griffiths described the streets in Wuhan as ‘completely deserted’ and that she had been advised to remain in the hotel where people are wearing face masks.

British expats are reportedly exchanging angry messages on social media about the apparent intransigence of the Foreign Office in response to their pleas to ‘get us out of here’.

One angry British expat simply told fellow members of a social media chat group: ‘London thinks you’re all dead!’ Another unnamed member of a WeChat group – the Chinese equivalent of WhatsApp – stormed: ‘There hasn’t been any engagement with the British citizens in Wuhan by the Foreign Office. It’s an utter p***take that we’re being left here like this.’

France’s health minister Agnes Buzyn yesterday said officials would put ‘hundreds’ of citizens on a direct flight to the country later in the week. She said authorities were working on arranging a bus service to get the expats to the airport.

There are thought to be some 800 French citizens stranded in the Wuhan area. She said French nationals will be held in quarantine for two weeks on arrival to stop the virus spreading on home soil. French car manufacturer Peugeot Citroen, which has a factory in Wuhan, said it was moving foreign employees and their families by bus to be quarantined in another city.

The US State Department is organising a single flight out of Wuhan tomorrow directly to San Francisco. It said in the event there are not enough seats, priority will be given to to individuals ‘at greater risk from coronavirus’. 

A family travelling near the border of China’s Hubei province, where Wuhan is, have their temperatures taken in their car

ASTHMATICS BEWARE: KILLER VIRUS COULD TRIGGER DEADLY ATTACKS 

Millions of asthmatics have been warned the killer coronavirus outbreak could pose a lethal threat by triggering a life-threatening attack.

Asthma UK warned that the entire family of viruses – not just this never-before-seen strain – can exacerbate symptoms of the common condition.

Emma Rubach, the charity’s head of health advice, said: ‘Respiratory viruses bring an increased risk of asthma symptoms and potentially life-threatening attacks.

She urged asthmatics to wash their hands frequently – advice mirrored by respectable bodies around the world – to reduce the risk of catching the virus.

Figures show there are around 5.4million asthma sufferers in the UK. In the US, the number is closer to the 25million mark.

Officials invited US citizens with a valid passport to contact the embassy in Beijing. Private citizens are expected to later repay the travel costs, the notice said. There are roughly 1,000 Americans living in and around the Wuhan area.

Japan said it planned to evacuate all of its citizens using chartered flights. It claimed it was in final discussions about the logistics with Chinese authorities. Some 430 Japanese nationals reside in or near Wuhan.

The government is also considering evacuation by road from Hubei Province, and have Japanese nationals take flights home from other places, according to Japanese media. 

Spain’s foreign minister Arancha Gonzalez tweeted this morning that Spanish official are trying to evacuate 20 Spaniards stranded in Hubei province. She did not provide further details.  

And the Thai government is meeting today to discuss how to evacuate the 70 known expats living in Wuhan, most of whom are students. Air force commander ACM Manat Wongwat said that up to four planes with medical staff are on stand-by to evacuate its citizens in the coming days. 

British boarding schools have today been advised to be alert to the prospect of Chinese students being racially abused due to the coronavirus outbreak. Guidance issued by the Boarding Schools’ Association suggests they should look out for prejudice towards Chinese students by others – either in person or on social media. 

China sends more pupils to UK fee-paying schools than any other country, with latest figures indicating that Chinese children make up around one in six of all international students.  

On the issue of xenophobia, A BSA spokesperson said: ‘We have not heard of anything happening in our schools, and we don’t envisage it happening in our schools, we are trying to make sure we are covering every eventuality.’ 

Chinese authorities today released the first pictures of the new strain of coronavirus. China’s National Microbiology Data Centre published images of the infection they extracted from two patients in Wuhan.

WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF THE CORONAVIRUS?

Once someone has caught the virus it may take between two and 14 days for them to show any symptoms.

If and when they do, typical signs include:

• a runny nose
• a cough
• sore throat
• fever (high temperature)

The vast majority of patients – at least 97 per cent, based on available data – will recover from these without any issues or medical help.

In a small group of patients, who seem mainly to be the elderly or those with long-term illnesses, it can lead to pneumonia. 

Pneumonia is an infection in which the insides of the lungs swell up and fill with fluid. It makes it increasingly difficult to breathe and, if left untreated, can be fatal and suffocate people. 

And the mayor of Wuhan today admitted that his government withheld information about an outbreak from the public. Zhou Xianwang confessed that his team had not released information about the situation ‘timely’. 

He also said that the city had seen human-to-human transmission of the novel coronavirus on a large scale. The revelations came after Mr Zhou yesterday disclosed that around five million Wuhan residents had left the city before it went into lockdown last Thursday. He has offered to resign amid criticism that response to the outbreak came too slowly.

Workers are now four days into their drastic plan to build an entire hospital from scratch in less than seven days – the spontaneous build was ordered on Thursday last week.

Incredible footage and photos revealed today show the rapid progress being made at the hospital, named the Huoshenshan or ‘Fire God Mountain’ Hospital, since its building was ordered last week.

A fleet of diggers all working at once has cleared space for the 1,000-bed facility and workers have now started to erect the pre-fabricated structure. One wing of the hospital was built in just 16 hours. 

The authorities have instructed four construction companies to toil through the Chinese New Year holiday in order to complete the six-acre centre in Caidian District in a week. It is expected to receive its first patients on February 3, according to state media.

World shares have slipped to their lowest in two weeks as worries grow about the economic impact of China’s ever-spreading coronavirus, with demand spiking for safe-haven assets such as Japanese yen and Treasury notes. 

By midday in London, MSCI’s All-Country World Index, which tracks shares across 47 countries, was down 0.6 per cent to its lowest since 9 January.

‘The coronavirus is an economic and financial shock. The extent of that shock still needs to be assessed, but it could provide the spark for an arguably long-overdue adjustment in the capital markets,’ Marc Chandler, chief market strategist at Bannockburn Securities, told clients. 

GOVERNMENTS MUST IMPLEMENT ‘DRACONIAN’ TRAVEL CURBS TO STOP CHINA’S CORONAVIRUS BECOMING A GLOBAL EPIDEMIC 

Experts tracking the outbreak have today said Governments need to implement ‘draconian’ travel curbs to stop the coronavirus outbreak in China becoming a global epidemic.

Scientists at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) presented a briefing warning that the spread of the deadly SARS-like virus that first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan was accelerating.

‘We have to be prepared that this particular epidemic may be about to become a global epidemic,’ said Gabriel Leung, head of the team. ‘Substantial, draconian measures limiting population mobility should be taken sooner, rather than later.’ 

Leung leads a group of researchers who are mapping the virus, which has so far infected around 2,900 people in China and killed 82 people.

While the epicentre remains in Wuhan and the central Chinese province of Hubei, it has since spread to some of the country’s biggest cities — including Beijing, Shanghai and Chongqing, and the southern cities of Shenzhen and Guangzhou.

‘We are expecting to see epicentres of self-sustaining epidemics in these other major city clusters on the mainland,’ Leung predicted.

And experts tracking the outbreak have today said Governments need to implement ‘draconian’ travel curbs to stop the coronavirus outbreak in China becoming a global epidemic.

Scientists at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) presented a briefing warning that the spread of the deadly SARS-like virus that first emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan was accelerating.

‘We have to be prepared that this particular epidemic may be about to become a global epidemic,’ said Gabriel Leung, head of the team. ‘Substantial, draconian measures limiting population mobility should be taken sooner, rather than later.’ 

Despite growing fears about the virus on the streets of Britain, thousands of revellers celebrated Chinese new year over the weekend. Infection concerns did not dampen festivities, as a 50-foot golden dragon and a bagpipe procession travelled across London from Charing Cross to Chinatown where hundreds of red lanterns lined the streets. 

The international situation got worse over the weekend, when France, Canada and Australia declared their first cases, bringing the total to 12 infected countries outside of China and its territories. 

There have also been infections confirmed in Thailand, the US, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and Nepal. China and the territories Macau, Hong Kong and Taiwan have also all had cases. 

Thailand, where there have been at least eight confirmed diagnoses, has been the worst hit outside of China, followed by eight in Hong Kong and five in Macau, the US and Australia. 

In a step up in the global response, Microsoft founder Bill Gates’s Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation today announced it would donate $10million (£7.64m) to help stop the outbreak and that it was already giving funding to public and private firms in China. 

Meanwhile, countries around the world are taking various steps to try and stop the virus reaching their shores, from screening at airports, to warning citizens away from China and even closing borders.   

CHINESE STUDENT WHO TRAVELLED TO IRELAND FROM WUHAN IS PUT INTO ISOLATION 

A Chinese student has quarantined himself in Ireland as a ‘precautionary measure’ after travelling from Wuhan, it can be revealed.

The patient, whose identity hasn’t been revealed, only arrived in Ireland yesterday. It is thought he left Wuhan before the city was put on lockdown.

Waterford Live reports he has agreed not to attend college and stay in his accommodation by himself. He does not have any symptoms.

He studies at the Waterford Institute of Technology. Health officials are in direct contact with the college on how to deal with the student.

Mongolia today closed its land border with China and said no vehicles or pedestrians would be allowed to cross onto its land. Germany has told its citizens not to go to China at all unless it is necessary.

And travellers from Wuhan or the Hubei province, where the city is located, will not be allowed the enter the territories of Macau or Hong Kong, or Malaysia. 

China’s health minister, Ma Xiaowei, yesterday said authorities have cranked up efforts to stop the spread of disease after admitting that they have limited knowledge of how the virus mutates.

Mr Ma said ‘it seems like the ability of the virus to spread is getting stronger’ and added that the state will continue to restrict public transport and scrap planned public gatherings.

President Xi Jinping said at the weekend that the country, which has the biggest population in the world with some 1.4billion people, faced a ‘grave situation’. 

Yet top health official Gao Fu said the coronavirus was ‘not as powerful’ as the SARS outbreak which rocked China in 2003, although it is becoming more contagious.

WHAT IS CHINA’S TRAVEL SITUATION? 

Flights to and from China are still available – except in the Hubei province, where Wuhan is – but tourists may struggle to travel inside the country. 

The UK Foreign Office has advised against all travel to the Hubei province where the coronavirus spawned.

The eastern city of Wuhan is under lock-down and the government has enforced an effective travel ban, meaning public buses and trains, as well as roads, have all been closed so people cannot get in or out of the city.

The same measures were reportedly taken last week in at least a dozen nearby cities in Hubei, including Huanggang, Ezhou, Zhijiang, Dangyang, Qianjiang, Chibi, Xiantao, Lichuan, Jingmen, Xianning, Yichang and Enshi.

China’s two most major cities, Beijing and Shanghai, have announced bans on long-distance buses entering or leaving. 

Cruise operators including Royal Caribbean Cruises, and Costa Cruises said they had cancelled a combined 12 cruises that had been scheduled to embark from Chinese ports before February 2. 

Airports around the world have stepped up screening of passengers from China, although some health officials and experts have questioned the effectiveness of these efforts.

While SARS-infected people were only contagious when their symptoms were showing, coronavirus victims can infect others during their incubation period – the time between someone becoming infected and them actually feeling ill – which can be up to 14 days.

Professor Jonathan Ball, from the University of Nottingham, said this knowledge should make the World Health Organisation reconsider its decision not to declare a global health emergency.

He said: ‘Defining the scale of asymptomatic transmission remains key: if this is a rare event then its impact should be minimal in terms of the overall outbreak. 

‘But, if this transmission mode is contributing significantly then control becomes increasingly difficult. It’s looking like this coronavirus is behaving very differently to SARS and MERS, and this is a big concern. I would be surprised if WHO do not declare this as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern.’

It comes as it was revealed today that the chief of the World Health Organisation has flown to Beijing to host emergency talks with the government about how to stop the deadly Wuhan coronavirus.

World Health Organisation chief, Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, flew to Beijing yesterday for crisis talks with Chinese officials today. The WHO last week decided not to declare the outbreak a global emergency – it is not clear if this will be reconsidered today.

In a tweet posted last night Dr Ghebreyesus said: ‘I am on my way to Beijing, to meet with the Government & health experts supporting the #coronavirus response. My colleagues and I would like to understand the latest developments and strengthen our partnership with in providing further protection against the outbreak.’   

What do we know about the deadly coronavirus? What are the symptoms… and how worried SHOULD the world really be?

BRITISH BOARDING SCHOOLS ADVISED TO BE ALERT TO PROSPECT OF CHINESE STUDENTS BEING RACIALLY ABUSED 

British boarding schools have been advised to be alert to the prospect of Chinese students being racially abused due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Guidance issued by the Boarding Schools’ Association suggests they should look out for prejudice towards Chinese students by others – either in person or on social media.

It also says that pupils who do travel to China should be told that when they return to the UK they may face ‘protective measures’, including quarantine.

China sends more pupils to UK fee-paying schools than any other country, with latest figures indicating that Chinese children make up around one in six of all international students. 

The BSA suggests that pupils from affected areas should be ‘suitably and publicly supported’.

‘They will be worried about themselves but more particularly about their friends and families,’ the advice says.

And it also counsels schools to ‘stay alert for any signs of xenophobia by students towards one another, or by any external audiences, either in school or on social media sites’.

‘Such behaviour should not be tolerated and action should be taken against anyone acting in this way,’ it adds.

On the issue of xenophobia, A BSA spokesperson said: ‘We have not heard of anything happening in our schools, and we don’t envisage it happening in our schools, we are trying to make sure we are covering every eventuality.’

It emerged yesterday that the deadly coronavirus spreading across Asia is far more contagious than previously thought and someone who is infected can spread it with just a simple cough or a sneeze, scientists say.

Twenty-six people with the virus are now confirmed to have died and more than 800 have been infected in at least nine countries. But experts predict the true number of people with the disease could be as many as 10,000 as they warn it may kill as many as two in 100 cases.  Here’s what we know so far:

What is the Wuhan coronavirus? 

A coronavirus is a type of virus which can cause illness in animals and people. It is an RNA virus (RNA is a type of genetic material called ribonucleic acid), which means it breaks into cells inside the host of the virus and uses them to reproduce itself.

This coronavirus from Wuhan is one which has never been seen before this outbreak. It is currently named 2019-nCoV, and does not have a more detailed name because so little is known about it.

Dr Helena Maier, from the Pirbright Institute, said: ‘Coronaviruses are a family of viruses that infect a wide range of different species including humans, cattle, pigs, chickens, dogs, cats and wild animals. 

‘Until this new coronavirus was identified, there were only six different coronaviruses known to infect humans. Four of these cause a mild common cold-type illness, but since 2002 there has been the emergence of two new coronaviruses that can infect humans and result in more severe disease (Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) coronaviruses). 

‘Coronaviruses are known to be able to occasionally jump from one species to another and that is what happened in the case of SARS, MERS and the new coronavirus. The animal origin of the new coronavirus is not yet known.’ 

The first human cases were publicly reported from the Chinese city of Wuhan, where approximately 11million people live, three weeks ago after medics first started seeing cases in December.

By January 8, 59 suspected cases had been reported and seven people were in critical condition. Tests were developed for the new virus and recorded cases started to surge.

In some cities the government is forcing people to wear masks to stop them either catching or spreading the quickly worsening virus (Pictured: Workers in a factor in Nantong, Jiangsu)

Wuhan, which is in near-total lockdown, can be seen deserted earlier today, January 27. People are no longer allowed in or out of the city because the government is desperately trying to stop the virus spreading

People trying to use the subway in Beijing, China’s capital some 700miles (1,152km) from Wuhan, are met by medical workers in protective clothing

AIR FRANCE IS STILL OFFERING FLIGHTS FROM LONDON TO WUHAN THIS WEEKEND

A brazen airliner is still selling flights from London to the coronavirus-ravaged Chinese city of Wuhan from as early as this weekend, MailOnline can reveal.  

For as little as £205 travellers can book online with Air France to fly from Heathrow to the outbreak’s epicentre on Sunday evening. 

The journey involves an overnight stay at the Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport in the French capital but arrives in Wuhan on Wednesday morning, local time.  

It comes despite Wuhan and the wider Hubei province, home to around 60million people, supposedly being completely sealed off and quarantined. 

Airports were reported to have been shut, planes grounded, and trains and buses banned from leaving or entering the region in a desperate bid to stop the outbreak.  

The Foreign Office warned it ‘advises against all travel to Hubei province due to the ongoing novel coronavirus outbreak’, adding ‘if you are in this area and able to leave, you should do so’.

The first person died that week and, by January 16, two were dead and 41 cases were confirmed. The next day, scientists predicted that 1,700 people had become infected, possibly up to 4,500.

Today, just one week later, there have been more than 800 confirmed cases and those same scientists estimate that some 4,000 – possibly 9,700 – were infected in Wuhan alone. There are now 10 countries with confirmed cases and 26 people have died. 

Where does the virus come from?

Nobody knows for sure. Coronaviruses in general tend to originate in animals – the similar SARS and MERS viruses are believed to have originated in civet cats and camels, respectively.

The first cases of the virus in Wuhan came from people visiting or working in a live animal market in the city, which has since been closed down for investigation.

Although the market is officially a seafood market, other dead and living animals were being sold there, including wolf cubs, salamanders, snakes, peacocks, porcupines and camel meat.

Bats are a prime suspect – researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences said in a recent statement: ‘The Wuhan coronavirus’ natural host could be bats… but between bats and humans there may be an unknown intermediate.’

And another scientific journal article has suggested the virus first infected snakes, which may then have transmitted it to people at the market in Wuhan.

Peking University researchers analysed the genes of the coronavirus and said they most closely matched viruses which are known to affect snakes. They said: ‘Results derived from our evolutionary analysis suggest for the first time that snake is the most probable wildlife animal reservoir for the 2019-nCoV,’ in the Journal of Medical Virology.

So far the fatalities are quite low. Why are health experts so worried about it? 

Experts say the international community is concerned about the virus because so little is known about it and it appears to be spreading quickly.

It is similar to SARS, which infected 8,000 people and killed nearly 800 in an outbreak in Asia in 2003, in that it is a type of coronavirus which infects humans’ lungs.  

Another reason for concern is that nobody has any immunity to the virus because they’ve never encountered it before. This means it may be able to cause more damage than viruses we come across often, like the flu or common cold.

Speaking at a briefing yesterday, Oxford University professor, Dr Peter Horby, said: ‘Novel viruses can spread much faster through the population than viruses which circulate all the time because we have no immunity to them.

The Chinese city ravaged by a deadly new virus has vowed to build a special, 1,000-bed hospital in less than a week to fight an outbreak that has left at least 82 people dead in the country. In the picture above, mechanical equipment are seen working on the construction site of the coronavirus hospital in the Caidian District in the western suburb of Wuhan, China, on January 24

Passengers at Nanjing South railway station have their temperatures scanned by a masked employee. The system is used to try and detect people with fevers – fever is a symptom of viral infection

‘Most seasonal flu viruses have a case fatality rate of less than one in 1,000 people. Here we’re talking about a virus where we don’t understand fully the severity spectrum but it’s possible the case fatality rate could be as high as two per cent.’

If the death rate is truly two per cent, that means two out of every 100 patients who get it will die. 

WHAT IS THE SITUATION IN THE US? 

Five people have been diagnosed with the Wuhan coronavirus in the US.

The cases have been confirmed in Washington state; Chicago, Illinois; Orange County, California; Los Angeles, California; and Arizona. 

None of the patients have died and all are in hospital. 

All the patients had travelled to Wuhan, the city at the centre of the outbreak, before they became ill, CNN reported. 

There have been dozens of other suspected cases and people tested – the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said on Friday that it was monitoring 63 people in 22 states. 

‘My feeling is it’s lower,’ Dr Horby added. ‘We’re probably missing this iceberg of milder cases. But that’s the current circumstance we’re in.

‘Two per cent case fatality rate is comparable to the Spanish Flu pandemic in 1918 so it is a significant concern globally.’

How does the virus spread?

Information has emerged today, Thursday, suggesting that the illness may spread between people just through coughs and sneezes, making it an extremely contagious infection.

It is believed to travel in the saliva and therefore close contact, kissing and sharing cutlery or utensils are risky. Because it infects the lungs, it is also likely present in droplets people cough up which, when inhaled, can infect the next person.

Originally, people were thought to be catching it from a live animal market in Wuhan city. But cases soon began to emerge in people who had never been there, which forced medics to realise it was spreading from person to person.

There is now evidence that it can spread third hand – to someone from a person who caught it from another person.

What does the virus do to you? What are the symptoms?

Once someone has caught the virus it may take between two and 14 days for them to show any symptoms.

The hospital is modelled on a temporary medical centre, which was built in Beijing in seven days to tackle SARS in 2003 and treated one-seventh of the country’s SARS patient in the space of two months. In the picture above, dozens of diggers work to build the six-acre coronavirus hospital in in the Caidian District in the western suburb of Wuhan, China, on January 25

The authorities have instructed four construction companies to toil through the Chinese New Year holiday in order to complete the urgent task. This photo shows excavators and trucks on the construction site of a new hospital on January 27

CORONAVIRUS IS PROBABLY ALREADY IN THE UK, LEADING OFFICIAL WARNS 

The killer coronavirus that is rapidly sweeping the world may already be in the UK, according to a leading official.

Professor Yvonne Doyle said the first case is likely to be somebody already in the UK who did not have any symptoms when they landed on British soil.

In hope of halting a potential outbreak in Britain, she said it is ‘absolutely critical’ the public health service and the NHS are ready for when the first case happens. 

Professor Yvonne Doyle, medical director and director of health protection for PHE, admitted that airports are ‘important’ spreaders of viruses.

But in an interview with Sky News she added: ‘The most likely place we might find a case is somebody in the country already.

‘It’s absolutely critical the public health service and the NHS are ready to diagnose that and are able to designate the person to the right facilities.’

Asked if she was alarmed about a UK case, she said: ‘I think, with infections, health is global.

‘We’ve been here before, we’ve dealt with Middle Eastern virus, we’ve dealt with SARS, we deal with flu regularly, which can be dangerous, but we’re ready.’

And asked if there could be cases already in Britain, she said: ‘I would expect so.’

If and when they do, typical signs include a runny nose, a cough, sore throat and a fever (high temperature). The vast majority of patients – at least 97 per cent, based on available data – will recover from these without any issues or medical help.

In a small group of patients, who seem mainly to be the elderly or those with long-term illnesses, it can lead to pneumonia. Pneumonia is an infection in which the insides of the lungs swell up and fill with fluid. It makes it increasingly difficult to breathe and, if left untreated, can be fatal and suffocate people. 

What have genetic tests revealed about the virus? 

Scientists in China have recorded the genetic sequences of around 19 strains of the virus and released them to experts working around the world. 

This allows others to study them, develop tests and potentially look into treating the illness they cause.   

Examinations have revealed the coronavirus did not change much – changing is known as mutating – much during the early stages of its spread.

However, the director-general of China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Gao Fu, yesterday said the virus was mutating and adapting as it spread through people.

This means efforts to study the virus and to potentially control it may be made extra difficult because the virus might look different every time scientists analyse it.   

More study may be able to reveal whether the virus first infected a small number of people then change and spread from them, or whether there were various versions of the virus coming from animals which have developed separately.

How dangerous is the virus?  

The virus has so far killed 26 people out of a total of at least 800 officially confirmed cases – a death rate of around three per cent. This is a higher death rate than the Spanish Flu outbreak which, in 1918, went on to kill around 50million people.

However, experts say the true number of patients is likely considerably higher. Imperial College London researchers estimate that there were 4,000 (up to 9,700) cases in Wuhan city alone up to January 18 – officially there have only been 444 there to date. If cases are in fact 100 times more common than the official figures, the death rate may be considerably lower.

The pressing construction task has been assigned to four government-run firms, China Construction Third Engineering Bureau, Wuhan Construction Engineering Group, Wuhan Municipal Engineering Design and Research Institute as well as Wuhan Hanyan Municipal Construction Group. Pictured, workers are seen at the construction site of the hospital today

Zhou Xianwang, the mayor of Wuhan, confessed that his team had not released information about the situation ‘timely’ during an interview with state broadcaster CCTV today

Saudi Arabia’s health ministry released rigorous hand-washing guidance in a desperate bid to stop the virus from spreading. It included using a paper towel to handle the tap

For as little as £205 travellers can book with Air France to fly from Heathrow to the outbreak’s epicentre on Sunday evening

WOULD THE NHS BE ABLE TO COPE WITH ANY POTENTIAL CASES OF THE KILLER CORONAVIRUS? 

Fears overwhelmed NHS hospital would struggle to cope with cases of the killer Wuhan coronavirus are growing, with one concerned medic asking: ‘Where will we find extra beds?’

Den Langhor, who claims to be an emergency medicine consultant, mocked Health Secretary Matt Hancock for claiming the UK is ‘well prepared and well-equipped for potential cases.

She tweeted: ‘Mate, the NHS wasn’t even prepared for winter and we’ve had all year to plan for that. Getting the Ebola gear out of the cupboard does not constitute [as] well prepared.’

Ms Langhor added: ‘Hospitals [are already] running at full capacity. If extra beds are needed where will we find them?’

Professor Doyle, medical director and director of health protection for Public Health England, said it is ‘absolutely critical’ that the NHS is ready.

And Former Foreign and Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt said the spread of the killer virus to the UK would be ‘very, very challenging for the NHS’.

Discussing the impact it could have on the health service, the past president of the Society for Acute Medicine warned there is ‘obviously a great concern about the global spread’.

Dr Nick Scriven told MailOnline: ‘If there is a surge in a respiratory-type illness, similar to influenza, in the UK it could put our existing services… under severe extra strain at a time when they are already working at pretty much full capacity.’

The NHS posted its worst ever A&E performance in December, the most recent month figures are available for. Just 79.8 per cent of patients were cared for in four hours, meaning almost 400,000 waited longer.

Doctors’ organisations have repeatedly said the NHS is stuck in a ‘spiral of decline’ and staff are dealing with ‘pressures the like of which we have never seen’.

Experts say it is likely only the most seriously ill patients are seeking help and are therefore recorded – the vast majority will have only mild, cold-like symptoms. For those whose conditions do become more severe, there is a risk of developing pneumonia which can destroy the lungs and kill you.  

Can the virus be cured? 

The Wuhan coronavirus cannot currently be cured and it is proving difficult to contain.

Antibiotics do not work against viruses, so they are out of the question. Antiviral drugs can, but the process of understanding a virus then developing and producing drugs to treat it would take years and huge amounts of money.

No vaccine exists for the coronavirus yet and it’s not likely one will be developed in time to be of any use in this outbreak, for similar reasons to the above.

The National Institutes of Health in the US, and Baylor University in Waco, Texas, say they are working on a vaccine based on what they know about coronaviruses in general, using information from the SARS outbreak. But this may take a year or more to develop, according to Pharmaceutical Technology.

Currently, governments and health authorities are working to contain the virus and to care for patients who are sick and stop them infecting other people.

People who catch the illness are being quarantined in hospitals, where their symptoms can be treated and they will be away from the uninfected public.

And airports around the world are putting in place screening measures such as having doctors on-site, taking people’s temperatures to check for fevers and using thermal screening to spot those who might be ill (infection causes a raised temperature).

However, it can take weeks for symptoms to appear, so there is only a small likelihood that patients will be spotted up in an airport.

Is this outbreak an epidemic or a pandemic?   

The outbreak has not officially been confirmed as either an epidemic or a pandemic yet. This is likely because, despite the global concern, the number of people who have been confirmed to be infected is still relatively low.

A pandemic is defined by the World Health Organization as the ‘worldwide spread of a new disease’.

An epidemic is when a disease takes hold of a smaller community, such as a single country, region or continent.

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