well the statistics around the
coronavirus have been revised upwards
250 more deaths have been recorded
almost all of them are in Hubei Province
where this outbreak began and as you can
see from this graphic there's been a
huge spike in the number of cases -
there are now more than 48,000 in Hubei
that's up 15,000 and the upward shift is
in part because of a broader definition
of the virus and how it's being
diagnosed here's the World Health
Organization on that crucially we
understand that most of these cases
relate to a period going back over days
and weeks and our retrospectively
reported as cases since sometimes back
to the beginning of the outbreak itself
well here are the number of cases in
China going up and up we're now close to
60,000 the death toll in China is over
thirteen hundred and fifty but in
reality that figure is higher those who
die at home are not being counted in
official figures and the BBC knows from
having spoken to people in Wuhan that's
what people are choosing to do here's a
quote from an article on the BBC News
website we'd rather die at home than go
to quarantine and while this crisis is
escalating there's increasing pressure
on the authorities to senior officials
in Hubei have now been sacked let's get
more on this from Steven MacDonald in
Beijing now as to whether or not the
dismissal of those two senior Communist
Party officials on this very day is a
coincidence not I'm not sure but it
doesn't look good for them I mean the
who Bay Party secretary and the party
secretary as well for Wuhan City have
both been removed but somebody had to
take a fall for this I mean there's a
lot of public anger lot could have been
done to bring this under control before
millions of people left Wuhan and in
fact there's a lot of evidence showing
that in those early days they tried to
stop information getting out
and here's Celia Hatton on who could
replace those officials there's two new
men in place and in Hebei and in Wuhan
are both loyalists to see Jinping
especially the man in charge of the
province genome he comes from Shanghai
now he's a man known for tough security
measures but also last year he
implemented a citywide recycling program
in Shanghai now I know
probably doesn't sound that impressive
but in a city of 23 million almost
overnight to get all of those people to
suddenly follow new rules he managed to
pull it off that program is still in
place and it's being carried out across
China so here's a man who's known for
security and implementing really big
projects overnight while all those
skills are going to be needed because
scientists and officials are trying to
work together to factor a fashion and
effective response for more on that this
is David Heyman who directed the wh O's
response to the SARS virus in 2003 we're
all concerned about what we don't know
we know so far what's happening and what
we can see but what we don't know is the
real potential of this virus whether or
not this eventually could become a
disease endemic in humans like TB
influenza or others because influenza
also comes from animals into humans and
it sometimes becomes a permanent
resident another important detail is
that we know that this virus is not
spreading particularly quickly outside
of China here's David Heyman again well
certainly it spread throughout China and
China's making every effort they can in
the way that they do best to stop the
disease what's important though is those
24 sites outside of China and also the
cruise ships that's where the
information about how severe the disease
is we really come from because the
patients here are being monitored very
closely as are their contacts and we're
learning a lot as we see what happens in
these situations which hopefully will
lock down the disease in these countries
and not permit it to spread further well
let's shift our focus from China
further south to Vietnam because a town
in the far north of Vietnam of about
10,000 people is now under quarantine
following five cases of the virus this
is one image we have of the checkpoints
that have been set up on the outskirts
of the town from Vietnam we then shift
to Cambodia because that u.s. cruise
ship which had been turned away by five
countries has finally been allowed to
dock here it is he'd spent two weeks at
sea searching for somewhere to stop
despite the fact there are no confirmed
cases on board and is an image that we
saw online of passengers cheering and
clinking glasses as they finally arrived
in port and while they might celebrate
but for the motor
they're still going to have to remain on
board as a precautionary measure next we
have to talk about perhaps the cruise
ship that's been getting the most
attention the diamond princess currently
stuck in Yokohama in Japan it has over
three and a half thousand people on
board and no one's getting off that's
because of all those people at least 200
passengers and crew are infected rip't
Wingfield Hays is just beside in so the
number of infections on board the
Diamond Princess behind me here in
Yokohama has again jumped today 44 new
cases confirmed today that followed 39
cases yesterday and that brings the
total number of infections from the ship
to 218 and that means as we know now
that this is now the single biggest
outbreak of the Cova 19 virus anywhere
outside mainland China the Japanese
government has made a small concession
to the criticism that has been building
of its the way that its handling this
outbreak they've said that very elderly
people over the age of 80 will be
allowed to disembark if they have
underlying health conditions or if they
are in one of those inside cabins that
don't have any outside windows or
balconies so expect to see that start
happening maybe tonight or on Friday but
there are many questions that remain
first of all obviously is our infection
still taking place is the virus still
circulating around the ship no one
really knows and the other big question
is why still has the Japanese government
not managed to test all of the
passengers and crew on board now two
weeks ago a group of British nationals
were evacuated from Wuhan and China and
they've spent two weeks at a hospital in
northwest England well now all 83 of
them have been released you can see one
of them celebrating there they've all
been given the all-clear
Fiona trot was there as they left sort
of strange to eat is being for them
evacuated from China coming here to the
we're all signing a form agreeing to be
quarantined wondering do I have the
virus and then getting used to the
confinement itself one man
here Leah shouting I'm free so there's
relief here this afternoon but also
what's very very clear is that all of
the 83 people here are very very
grateful to the NHS staff for the care
they have received well the man
celebrating his release here is Matt raw
and he's been giving his reaction to the
BBC it is lovely absolutely lovely to be
out and I'll no doubt be going out for a
pint late a little bit later and well
who would blame him not that matt is
complaining about his ordeal I should
say I would say that 99.9% of us if not
100% of us are really happy to have been
here we're very grateful to have been
here you know the last thing that any
one of us would have wanted is to have
passed that virus on if we were infected
to pass it on to somebody else you know
you have to live with that you know if
somebody does get sick from it and and
and and and dies we'd have to live with
that for knowledge for the rest of our
lives and of course you know that's not
who we are we we most of us we travel a
lot we travel extensively and you know
there are risks associated with that so
we do take ourselves seriously as expats
and and of course we want to be as
responsible as possible and if that
means staying in quarantine for a couple
of weeks so be it