Wuhan lockdown prevents 12-42 million people from catching COVID-19: study
By Liu
Caiyu
The “decisive”
lockdown imposed in Wuhan, capital of Central China’s Hubei Province largely
cut off the COVID-19 infections, preventing 500,000 to 3 million more
infections in China and 12 to 42 million more infections in the globe,
according to a Chinese expert at Peking Union Medical College.
Liu
Yuanli, head of the school of public health in Peking Union Medical College
revealed the data during a live-streaming seminar at Tsinghua University on
Saturday, April 25.
The
Wuhan lockdown effectively cut off the spread of COVID-19, Liu said. The
lockdown helped reduce 500,000 to 3 million infections in China and 12 to 42
million infections globally, he said.
Wuhan
imposed the citywide lockdown on January 23, a day before the annual Chinese
Lunar New Year’s eve.
If the
lockdown wasn’t imposed on that day, then the next day would have seen the peak
of population flow for Chinese family reunions at Spring Festival, Liu said.
The
Wuhan lockdown sent a “very clear signal” about the upcoming epidemic and won “much
time” for the world, Yang Zhanqiu, deputy director of the pathogen biology
department at Wuhan University, told the Global Times on Sunday, April 26.
China’s
stringent measures significantly slowed the global spread of the virus and
earned a window period for the world.
Rather
than thanking China for reporting the virus and taking such decisive measures
to contain the virus spread, some outside China are surprisingly trying to
blame China for concealing the epidemic and hyping Wuhan is the virus origin,
which is absurd and unreasonable, Yang said.
Wuhan
sacrificed itself by locking the city and asking millions of residents to stay
at home in a timely manner when facing the COVID-19 epidemic, which is a common
enemy of the mankind. How come people are still trying to take China as a
scapegoat for the pandemic, experts said.
The
study offered strong evidence of how much Wuhan lockdown is essential for the
worldwide pandemic, however, miscommunication and underestimation were repeated
not only in Europe but also in the US, where governments and officials failed
to prevent infections from exploding in their countries, Chinese experts noted.
“Closure
of a city in the fight against epidemics has never happened not only in China,
but such a large-scale city lockdown has never happened in the history of the
world epidemic prevention,” said Liu, of Peking Union Medical College at the
live-streaming event on Saturday.
Wuhan
was locked at just the right time. “The lockdown sent a signal to the whole
country that the overall battle against the epidemic was starting,” Liu said.
There
were more than 400 confirmed cases on January 22 in Wuhan and on the next day
on January 23, Wuhan adopted strict measures to restrict people from leaving
the city.
It later
proved that the week after January 23 was a crucial week, Liu noted.
If the
city was closed one day or one week later, the impact of the epidemic would be “huge,”
Liu said.
“Facts
also proved,” Liu said, that 63 percent of that more than 80,000 cases
diagnosed nationwide were in Wuhan.
The
Wuhan lockdown was not simply a restriction on traffic but an overall
anti-epidemic policy for a city: medical treatment for patients, community
closed-loop management, mass screening and quarantine of residents, Liu noted.
Source:Global Times
Wuhan railway station reopens 76
days after city lockdown. Photo: Global Times
Wuhan lockdown prevents 12-42 million people from catching COVID-19: study
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