Some 900 million people in China have been infected with the coronavirus as of 11 January, according to a study by Peking University. The report estimates that 64% of the country’s population has the virus. It ranks Gansu province, where 91% of the people are reported to be infected, at the top, followed by Yunnan (84%) and Qinghai (80%). A top Chinese epidemiologist has also warned that cases will surge in rural China over the lunar new year. The peak of China’s Covid wave is expected to last two to three months, added Zeng Guang, ex-head of the Chinese Center for Disease Control.

Hundreds of millions of Chinese are traveling to their hometowns – many for the first time since the pandemic began – ahead of the lunar new year on 23 January. China has stopped providing daily Covid statistics since abandoning zero-Covid. But hospitals in big cities – where healthcare facilities are better and more easily accessible – have become crowded with Covid patients as the virus has spread through the country.

(News Source: BBC News)