The central Chinese city of Wuhan, the first Covid-19 pandemic epicentre where the virus emerged late last year, has no remaining cases in hospitals, China announced Sunday.
The novel coronavirus is believed to have originated in a wet seafood and meat market in Wuhan before spreading across China and then globally.
Early cases of Covid-19 were discovered among Wuhan residents in December. More than 2.8 million people have since been sickened by the rapidly spreading virus and nearly 200000 have died globally.
“The latest news is that by April 26, the number of new coronavirus patients in Wuhan was at zero, thanks to the joint efforts of Wuhan and medical staff from around the country,” national health commission (NHC) spokesperson Mi Feng said at a briefing in Beijing on Sunday.
The last patient in serious condition in Wuhan, capital of Hubei Province, was cured on Friday, reducing the number of these patients in the city to zero, Mi said.
Wuhan, however, recorded 20 new silent carriers of the virus on Friday, with 535 suspected patients under medical observation.
The city of around 11 million people was put under a total lockdown for 76 days starting January 23 but still saw the highest number of cases and fatalities in China.
According to the Chinese government’s revised estimates released earlier this month, the total confirmed infections in the city were 50,333 while there were 1290 more deaths, pushing the total number of fatalities to 3,869.