BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese President Xi Jinping on Tuesday made his first visit to Wuhan since a coronavirus outbreak forced a lockdown of the city of 11 million people, in a sign that authorities’ efforts to control the virus are working.
A screen shows a CCTV state media broadcast of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Wuhan at a shopping centre in Beijing as the country is hit by the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, China, March 10, 2020. REUTERS/Thomas Peter
Xi’s arrived on the same day that Wuhan shut the last of 14 temporary hospitals that had been opened to manage a surge in coronavirus patients, news website The Paper reported..
Earlier on Tuesday, China said it had just 19 new coronavirus infections on Monday, down from 40 a day earlier. That also marked the third straight day of no new domestically transmitted cases in mainland China outside of Hubei province, where Wuhan is located, even as the disease spreads rapidly in other countries, including Italy and the United States.
“The situation of coronavirus prevention in Hubei and Wuhan has shown positive changes and achieved phased results, initially realizing goals to stabilize and turn around the situation,” the official Xinhua news service cited Xi as saying.
He acknowledged that people under lengthy quarantine – Wuhan and much of Hubei province have been under strict controls