Corona Virus Deaths More Than SARS

Passengers from China at Soekarno Hatta Airport. (Irfan Meidianto / VOI)

JAKARTA - The number of deaths due to the corona virus from China has reached 811 people. This number exceeds the death toll from the SARS epidemic in 2002-2003, which is 774 people in the world.

Reported by the New York Times, China's National Health Commission said the number of confirmed infections to date has reached 37,198 cases. 89 deaths and 2,656 new cases were recorded in the previous 24 hours, most of them in Hubei Province, the heart of the outbreak.

Many doctors believe that the deaths and infections from the current epidemic in China are incalculable as testing facilities in hospitals and laboratories are under severe stress.

The number of new cases existing in China has stabilized in recent days. But World Health Organization (WHO) officials warned against reading too much of the numbers. This is because the provinces of Wuhan and Hubei are still in the midst of a serious outbreak.

"It's very, very early to make predictions," said Dr. Michael Ryan, Executive Director of the WHO Health Emergencies Program. "This is still a very, very intense outbreak in Wuhan and Hubei," he added.

The measures imposed in Hubei appear to be paying off in curbing the spread of the coronavirus. However, the Director General of WHO, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned that the virus could not be predicted.

"We have to understand them carefully because it can show stability for a few days and then they can improve," he said.

"I've said it many times, it's slow now but maybe accelerated," he added.