Coronavirus: Japan schools to close for several weeks- BBC News

Health officials in China say about 14% of patients who had the

coronavirus

but recovered in the southern province of Guangdong have tested positive for the virus again and the same phenomenon has been reported in Japan. Officials in both countries have said they are still learning about this. new virus in China, the number of infected continues to increase with 433 new cases reported on Wednesday, all but 24 of those located and which may be where it all began. The numbers in South Korea are continually increasing and the total number has now reached more than 1,700 and in the last hour we heard from the Prime Minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe, who announced that public

schools

will be

close

d from next Monday until the end of March, so we're taking you live to Tokyo and joining our correspondent there, Jenny Hilde.

That's a great announcement from Shinzo Abe, eh Jenny, it's really going to affect daily life in Japan, yes, and I think she gives an indication of how concerned the authorities here are about the situation. They are also very worried, of course. It is clear that they are aware of this situation because they have already been the subject of much criticism for their treatment of passengers who became infected on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, which is still moored offshore in the port of Yokohama. The number of cases in Japan is rising now, the vast majority, about 700 of them, originated aboard that cruise ship, but what worries authorities is the fact that separate cases are now emerging in clusters across the country. , particularly focused on the northern Hokkaido region, but on top of that, authorities are now really worried about this particular case: a woman in her 40s who was treated for the virus was discharged from the hospital in early February, but now it was learned that he tested positive for the virus again, which will be a cause for concern. not only here in Tokyo but to help dismayed experts around the world and the big headache for the Japanese authorities is that in just five months Tokyo will host the 2020 Olympic Games.

Arab planners around the world say that Tokyo 2020 authorities insist that their plans, their preparations will continue as normal, but today we heard from the Tokyo organizing committee that their executive director has said that the torch relay, which should begin in a few

weeks

and will travel around This whole country might well have to expand. down and Jenny, what's the last you heard from South Korea about the situation there? Well, South Korea continues to sound the alarm because just look at the time scale in just over a week they've gone from having a few dozen cases to now something more.

More than 1,700, many of those cases are linked to a religious sect and the authorities are struggling to test and test, they say, each member of that organization, but there are 200 thousand people and they continue to test them at the same time after it was known An American soldier in the country, as well as

several

South Korean soldiers, tested positive for the virus that the US and the South Korean military decided to cancel their annual joint military exercise, but there is still great concern about the situation there , which doesn't seem to be getting any better and they're watching across the water here in Japan with considerable alarm, you know?

If you look at China, the World Health Organization has said that although there are still people infected, they are still dying overall, the picture seems to be improving, but that is certainly not the case for other countries like South Korea, maybe even Japan in the region. Jenny, thank you for bringing us the image of all of Asia. Saudi Arabia has prevented foreign pilgrims from entering the country for religious visits, including to Islam's two holiest sites, Mecca and Medina. Millions of people go to the country throughout the year with a large increase. As for visitors during the Hajj in July, it is unclear whether this pilgrimage will be affected.

The country has also banned visitors from countries where the new corona virus has spread and in Iraq we heard that a sixth person contracted the Quran after traveling. Iran Baghdad today or during the closure of public gathering places, which means cinemas, cafes, clubs, all have been

close

d until March 7 to try to control the spread, so right now there is a real blockade in Iraq. Our correspondent Samia Hashmi, who joins us from Dubai, firstly, has there been any reaction when the Saudi authorities told foreign pilgrims that they cannot come? It's been a surprise, not a big surprise, Lucy, considering there's been the virus. has spread widely in the last three or four days, last week Iran first reported some cases of the corona virus and then over the last four days we saw Oman, Bahrain, Iraq, which was quiet, reporting confirmed cases and that number has increased substantially now. all of them are linked all of these cases the new cases that have emerged in Oman Bahrain Kuwait are linked to travelers who had gone to Iran for religious visits and how we returned to that country to their countries and that is the reason why the Saudi authorities No I wanted to take risks considering that thousands of people each month travel to the holiest Muslim cities - Mecca and Medina - and now with Ramadan starting at the end of April in less than two months, normally the number of people who travel to Saudi Arabia increase so clearly that the authorities did not want to take any risk, since so far there are no cases of

coronavirus

reported by Saudi Arabia, so it is a precaution that they are really taking before it generates more complications on the ground, yes also.

We will soon know that severe weather will affect the Hajj in a few months, but what about the very strict restrictions that are being implemented in Baghdad now with all these closures? Well, yes, Iraq is actually the latest country to announce these closures. Lucy Actually, it was Bahrain that was the first to announce it about two days ago, in fact, yesterday it was the first to cancel all Tuesday public celebrations nationwide and then there is Bahrain, which closed all

schools

, universities across the country. two

weeks

and now Iraq has followed the lead of these two countries and decided to go and close virtually, it has been announced now, we still have to wait and see how strictly it is being enforced, but clearly the governments here in the Gulf are concerned because There has been a rampant increase and there is concern that the number could increase so clearly that they do not want to take any risks and are trying to ensure that this does not happen.

The numbers are growing and increasing substantially here in Dubai, in fact in the United Arab Emirates. was one of the first Gulf countries to report cases of the corona virus in the last week of January, but officially the number has been around 13 and has not increased substantially, at least in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Sameach, thank you for joining us from Dubai with that, and Samir mentioned that many 19 cases of covert infection in the Middle East can be traced back to people who recently returned from Iran, now state media in Tehran says that so far 26 people have died from the virus with a total of 245 confirmed cases and the country's Health Minister is now asking people to avoid unnecessary travel and at least update what is happening in Australia.

The government is deciding to extend the travel ban on foreigners arriving from China for at least another week. Prime Minister Scott Morrison said that everything indicates that the world is about to be affected by a coronavirus pandemic, a view that was also recently echoed by French President Emmanuel Macron: we are facing a crisis, an epidemic that is coming and some countries are already much more affected, we have to organize ourselves differently at each stage and deal with it as best we can president macro in France, of course, on the frozen border, we go where the country's Civil Protection Agency ends to say that two more people have died bringing the death toll there to 214 the number of cases rises to 400

several

European countries have also announced new cases traced to Italy our correspondent Bethenny Bell is in Milan for us Bethenny has just updated us with the latest images from northern Italy well, literally I just found out that the number of cases has exceeded 500 and in addition to the two additional deaths that have been reported, 14 people now instead of the 12 that had been recorded until now, we understand that among the new infections, at least four children have contracted the virus schools remain closed in much of northern Italy universities are closed here in Milan the main tourist areas are closed but as you can see behind me people are still with your work and it's very interesting there's definitely a sense of insecurity here, but it's very A lot depends on who you talk to as to how people are assessing this risk.

Some people say why the government didn't act sooner. You should have made mistakes in your initial handling of this and we need to be as careful as possible. Other people tell me. This is an overreaction. Italy is still safe and open for business. What is your advice for people who want to travel right now? Bethenny, that varies a lot from country to country. Different countries have done different things for their citizens from one end. where a couple of countries have said that they will put in planes to allow their citizens to return to their homes and other places, and they have said that if you have been in an area one of the hot spots, those groups of countless groups of cities just south of Milan where the disease came out, if you have been there and you need to isolate or if you have been in this region and the north and you start to have symptoms, you should isolate, but in general at the moment the European Union says that we are keeping the borders open that this It's a serious situation but it's not a cause for panic Bethenny thanks for joining us from Milan there's plenty to talk to with our focus medical correspondent Walsh who just joined me now in the focus studio can we start first with this

news

from China and Japan it's an injured case of someone who left the hospital, apparently had the coronavirus fine but then tested positive again, what do you know about it?

So what we know is that no one is sure why this is because The virus has only been around in human terms spreading from person to person for a couple of months, so there is a huge amount of things we don't know at the moment. regard. There are viruses that enter the body and then can be latent and reappear again. It's probably more likely. that the person never got rid of it now that you can get infected with diseases again if your immune system drops and you lose your immunity or the virus changes enough that you can get infected again it doesn't seem like the virus is changing much at the moment, no it is clear if in these cases the woman in Japan was actually free of the disease and in the Chinese cases they were doing anal swabs for their follow-up tests and that is how they said all these people had tested positive.

Again, there is a lot of uncertainty, people are scratching their heads and coming up with all sorts of theories as to why this might be the case. Are there different ways to test people for the virus? Yeah, so the standard way to do the test is to take nose and throat swabs, and if people are really sick, then you can take samples of their lung tissue and they gave them to you, and if done correctly, they're pretty accurate and you can get a genetic readout of not only the virus, but you can track exactly where it came from so you can see. whether it's because of the genetic code of that test, whether it's similar to what's happening in China or another country, but when you do a simple test like taking a nose and throat swab, the virus may not be detected if you don't It is done correctly, so the tests are not perfect and the result is obtained quite quickly.

Normally it takes a day or two for that result to appear, depending on the system and how many 10 thousands the labs are doing, but in the UK it's sort of a 48. turnaround time of an hour or more can be done fast how widely information is shared to what extent our governments and health authorities work together well I think China, although it hid very poorly at first subsequently, once it realized the seriousness of this infection then shared information very quickly, shared the German genetic code of the virus and did it internationally and that allowed teams from all over the world to start working on vaccines, although we can forget about those that have been ready for a long time at any time. numbers, so no, there is a lot of information being shared, so finally focus on what worries our global health authorities most today: they are worried about Iran, Italy and South Korea and the fact that in those countries especially it can probably be put a multiple of one hundred to one thousand per reported case, which is not necessarily a criticism of those countries, but especially in Iran, if you look at thenumber of deaths and the number of cases reported, there must be multiples of hundreds or thousands of cases that have not been reported and then they are worried that that will spread globally and that China now has fewer daily cases than the rest of the world combined , so now this is very much a global issue, not just something related to China's approach.

Thank you so much. why good to have you with us