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Nearly half a million residents of the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the new coronavirus was first detected in December last year, may have been infected with SARS-CoV-2. This figure is almost ten times higher than the official number of cases confirmed by Chinese authorities, according to a study by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
The study was based on a sample of 34,000 residents of Wuhan, the first epicenter of the pandemic, and other places heavily affected by the disease in Hubei province. Residents from Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Sichuan, and Liaoning were also included in the analysis. The objective was to estimate the rates of infection by covid-19.
The researchers found that the antibody prevalence rate among those 34,000 residents of Wuhan, a metropolis of about 11 million people, was 4.4%. This means that that segment of the population was, at some point, in contact with the virus and ended up developing antibodies against the disease. This ratio suggests that up to 500,000 residents may have been infected, nearly ten times more than the 50,354 officially confirmed cases as of Sunday, according to the latest data from the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission.
Compared to other cities in the same province, this rate is significantly higher, suggesting that more people were exposed to the virus without being counted. In other cities in Hubei, for example, only 0.44% of residents had antibodies against the new coronavirus. And outside the province, these immunoglobulins were detected in only two people of the more than 12,000 residents included in the study.
The results were posted on the CDC’s official Chinese account on the WeChat social messaging network. However, it is not said whether the study was published or will be published in scientific journals, but it is said that these conclusions will not be considered for the final statistics on the disease in China. According to CNN, Chinese officials say the study was carried out a month after China managed to “contain the first wave of the covid-19 epidemic.”
“The results of the study show that our country has a low prevalence rate. This indicates that China was able to control the epidemic in Wuhan, the main battlefield, and effectively controlled the large-scale spread of the epidemic, ”say those responsible for the study.
Healthcare professionals around the world have used serological studies to assess the true magnitude of epidemics. The results of these analyzes can help guide mitigation and vaccination efforts. In Portugal, the data from the latest survey of this type was published in July.
Journalist Sentenced for Reporting on Wuhan Outbreak
More than a year after the first case was detected, the origin of Covid-19 remains unknown, but the early stages of the outbreak revealed that authorities were slow to act. Also, at the end of December, several doctors in Wuhan were already warning of an unknown new disease, but the police detained several to “educate” them about the dangers associated with spreading rumors. One of them, Li Wenliang, ended up dying infected with the disease.
On Monday, Zhang Zhan, a freelance journalist who reported on the initial COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, was sentenced to four years in prison for “causing riot and causing trouble.”
Three weeks after the authorities announced the first case of “mysterious pneumonia” in Wuhan, central China, on December 31, the Chinese authorities took strict preventive measures, including the isolation of cities with millions of inhabitants.
For CNN, Yanzhong Huang, a senior international health expert, says that the findings of this study highlight the problem of underreporting cases not only during the first few weeks, but also in the most difficult months of the Wuhan epidemic. At first, for example, asymptomatic cases were not included in the official count.
Furthermore, in January and February, when patients with a “strange form of pneumonia” began to occupy every bed in Wuhan hospitals, there was a lack of space, protective equipment, knowledge and resources to diagnose and treat the condition. Many patients were asked to go home and remain in isolation.
WHO team will travel to China in January
The Chinese government has been accused on several occasions of releasing more optimistic data in the early stages of the novel coronavirus outbreak than reality suggested, of delaying in confirming already diagnosed cases and of minimizing the severity of the outbreak. But China has vehemently rejected accusations by several Western governments that it deliberately withheld information about the virus. Last June, China’s State Council argued that the Chinese government has always released information about the epidemic in a “timely, open and transparent manner.”
Several governments have asked China to collaborate with a World Health Organization (WHO) investigation into the origins of the virus. To prepare for the arrival of an international mission to China, a WHO epidemiologist and animal health specialist was in the country this summer, and since then ten experts have been meeting regularly with Chinese scientists.
Although they believe that the original host of the virus is a bat, no one has yet identified the intermediate animal that allowed human contamination. On the one hand, it will be necessary to “go back in time” and examine the different traces maintained by the Chinese authorities, and see if there are previous cases, in addition to those identified at the end of 2019. Another approach will be to determine the role played by the Chinese market. Wuhan, where live exotic animals were sold. With lusa
