Two -thirds of the world's population can be infected with coronavirus - expert

The number of coronavirus carriers in China is growing, and the leading specialist of the WHO in infectious diseases warns that everything can become much worse: about two -thirds of the world’s population can become infected with a Chinese virus, Bloomberg writes .

• Such an assessment was given by Aira Lonzhini, who is engaged in WHO studies of the transfer of the Chinese virus. He came to the conclusion that billions can become infected, and not 60 thousand people, as it is now.
• Quarantine, introduced in several Chinese cities, is able to slow down the spread of the virus. The problem is that the virus had the opportunity to spread in Asia before finding itself with an outbreak of the epidemic, Lonzhini said.
• The epidemic modeling is based on a very important assumption - namely, that each infected will convey the disease to two or three people. The exact value of this parameter has not yet been established, but it is possible that it is much lower and the danger is exaggerated.
• The absence of mass fast tests and mild symptoms in some people contribute to the imperceptible spread of the epidemic (which does not allow their coronavirus to suspect them).
• China’s efforts to insulate the provinces covered by the epidemic in any case are not in vain, the expert emphasizes: they give the rest of the world the “window” for preparation.

WHO virologist is not the only expert with pessimistic forecasts about the Chinese virus. The researcher from the Imperial College of London Neil Ferguson estimated that in China up to 50 thousand people can be infected every day. Gabriel Leung, a public health professor at the University of Hong Kong, also predicted that almost two -thirds of the world can become infected with a virus, if you do not think of how to deal with it.

In China, today the number of pneumonia caused by the Covid-19 coronavirus was 63,851 people, a fatal outcome was recorded in 1380 cases, the State Committee for Healthcare of the PRC said. Over the past day alone, the number of infected increased by 5090 people increased in the country, deaths by 121.