China Says Coronavirus Cases Rise to 70,548, Deaths Hit 1,770

Tom, let me start with you because the director of a hospital in the city of Wuhan told us that maybe a tipping point had been reached when it came to these new infections. Now you are in Beijing, you have been to the capital. The feeling I get here talking to Chinese friends and contacts is that they don't really trust the numbers coming from the government in terms of classified infections. Look at the latest figures today, an additional 2048. The

cases

, as you say, worldwide are more than seventy thousand

cases

and, as you point out in the death toll according to this data, at least one thousand seven hundred and seventy, but there is certainly a lack of trust here on the ground among the people When it comes to the infection rate and whether or not, frankly, you can believe the government on these figures in terms of the policies to further restrict the movement of people, we are seeing that on the ground here in the capital we come out from the city.

There are now roadblocks preventing people who are not residents of villages or townships from entering those places. The roads are closed, so clearly officials here in the capital on the outskirts are concerned that this virus could spread here and in Wuhan and specifically in the Bay Area. Of course, we have seen more draconian measures implemented by officials who have told families that they are not allowed to leave their homes unless it is an emergency and that private cars are banned throughout the province, a population of 60 million. people and most businesses there will also remain closed you talked about the People's Bank of China, the operations of the Multilateral Fund, of course the central bank has been interested in ensuring that there is enough liquidity in the system to ensure that there are no financial shocks , particularly in the market, and what we heard from the Finance Minister over the weekend said that he wants to see further cuts in taxes and fees, but that actually raises the question of how much firepower China really has in terms of stimulus fiscal, given that we know that the provinces in terms of their income flows are already limited and that raises another question: Will China have to increase its deficit ratio?

Also, there will be something for the future. Yes, with business and factory closures, just know that tax revenue is coming in right now. Vaughn, let me get back to you, it's not just China. Talking about these tax planning measures or fiscal expansion measures, we also heard a similar sentiment from Hong Kong and Singapore looking to open those coffers even before this outbreak. We expected at least bold measures from Hong Kong, a sizeable budget from Singapore due to the threat of trade war, of course, with Hong Kong, months of political protests, but this virus now only increases the urgency for greater fiscal spending and in the case of Hong Kong they are now proposing at least three point two billion dollars in new financing for the budget This year, this is after we learned that the finance secretary, Paul Chen, warned that these tsunamis shocked the economy and that this virus could have a larger effect that goes far beyond the FMV retail industries and tourism related industries on the budget coffers as you mentioned many times.

There are doubts about whether there is scope for this. According to Paul Chen, the deficit will likely continue for some time and the Singapore government will likely present a strong budget on Tuesday. Analysts predict the budget deficit could be the widest we've seen. seen or the largest we have seen in almost two decades, the fiscal gap could widen to one and a half percent of GDP and companies like Citigroup predict that this economic package could be more than half a billion dollars, which is three times more than the The Singapore government went through the star epidemic in 2003 and Tommy, who you talked about before, you know how degraded social trust and trust in the government is in some respects and the numbers that we are seeing at the moment, How is that reflected in terms? of leadership because there is even more confusion in terms of Xi's response or even when he started handling this crisis, absolutely another sign that officials here, senior leaders are trying to reshape the narrative again and that last single came out during the weekend, of course. over the last week they changed the officials, they changed the party leadership in Wuhan and who Bay, they changed the methodology in terms of counting the virus and now over the weekend they came out with a speech that the president apparently gave on the 3rd of February saying that he had been taking control of the situation since January VII that he was giving orders to local officials that it was he, the president, who said that the city of Wuhan should be locked down, so trying to show that it would be assumed that the president and his team were in control they were being decisive because of course they have faced pressure and criticism that it has been mishandled and that according to some there was a cover-up of course and that focused on the death of the whistleblower dr.

Lee Wen Liang tries to show that the president is being decisive, but this raises questions about the publication of this speech because if Xi Jinping was issuing these orders on January 7, why did he wait until January 20 to make public announcements about the corona virus? Publicly informing the people of China about the seriousness of this virus remains a question mark and again underlines the fact that this is a political situation, a political pressure point, a political challenge for China's leaders, as well as an economic challenge. and medical care. challenge of the system this is something the president will have to fight with; may not and is very unlikely to pose a significant threat to the Communist Party, but what it may do is lead to discussions within the party and that may lead to additional pressure on China's leader and Evon, before we go , just giving us the latest on that cruise ship that is quarantined and docked in Yokohama, Japan.

Yes, the diamond princess we learned about in the last few hours, the first charter flights flying from Japan to the USA. We have taken off this morning, this is after we saw the USA. Countries like Canada and Hong Kong They are moving to evacuate their citizens from the ship after we saw another 70 confirmed cases on the Diamond Princess and what we are learning so far is that when it comes to those who tested positive, those who tested positive will be taken to hospitals in Japan. negative will be on these charter flights where they will be quarantined for two weeks at Air Force bases in the United States.

California and Texas what we've learned and those who didn't get on these flights will remain in quarantine for another 14 days or so before they can fly and do more testing. We understand that not everyone on board has been tested. at the moment and the results take a couple of days to appear