The coronavirus crisis in China is deepening as the number of people infected by the virus has reached 31,000 and a doctor who was punished after raising alarm about the outbreak died from the pathogen on Friday.
More than 630 people have now been killed by a virus that ophthalmologist Li Wenliang and colleagues had first brought to light in late December.
The disease has since spread across China, prompting the government to lock down cities of tens of millions of people, while global panic has risen as more than 240 cases have emerged in two dozen countries.
A quarantined cruise ship in Japan now has 61 confirmed cases.
Li, 34, died early Friday, Wuhan Central Hospital said in a post on China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform, an announcement that triggered grief on social media — over a doctor who was hailed a hero — and anger over the government’s handling of the crisis.
“He is a hero who warned others with his life,” a fellow Wuhan doctor wrote on Weibo after reports of his death emerged.
“Those fat officials who live on public money, may you die from a snowstorm,” wrote one angry Weibo user.
His death also highlights the enormous risks that frontline doctors have taken to treat patients in overwhelmed and under-equipped hospitals in Wuhan, the quarantined city of 11 million people where the virus emerged in December.
Medical staff are overstretched and lack sufficient protective gear, the deputy governor of Hubei province admitted Thursday.
Li sent out a message about the new coronavirus to colleagues on December 30 in Wuhan — the central city at the epicentre of the crisis — but was later among eight whistleblowers summoned by police for “rumour-mongering.”
He later contracted the disease while treating a patient.
Censors even appeared to struggle with out how to deal with his death.
State-run newspaper Global Times and state broadcaster CCTV first reported on Weibo that Li had died late Thursday, only to delete their posts after the death rapidly surged to be among the top topics on the popular platform.
Even the World Health Organization reacted to the first reports of his death to express sadness.
Analysts have said that local authorities played down the extent of the outbreak in early January because they were holding political meetings at the time and wanted to project an aura of stability.
The first fatality was reported on January 11. The death toll has since soared to 636, with 73 more reported on Friday and an additional 3,000 new infections.
