The outbreak of coronavirus across China is likely to continue for over two to three months as some parts of the country are yet to be hit with the virus, said Zeng Guang, former chief scientist at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, according to a report published on January 12.
"Our priority focus has been on the large cities. It is time to focus on rural areas," Guang was quoted as saying at a press conference in China.
He said a large number of people in the countryside, where medical facilities are relatively poor, are being left behind, including the elderly, the sick and the disabled.
Infections are expected to surge in rural areas as millions are set to travel to their home towns for the Lunar New Year holidays, which officially start from January 21, also known as the world's largest annual migration of people, according to a report by Reuters.
Also Read | Search for foreign trips surges 10-fold soon after China eases travel bar
China last month abruptly abandoned the strict anti-virus regime of mass lockdowns, that fuelled historic protests across the country last year, and finally reopened its borders on January 8.
China's foreign ministry said the country's health officials have held five technical exchanges with the WHO over the past month and have been transparent.
Chinese health authorities have been reporting five or fewer deaths a day over the past month, numbers which are inconsistent with the long queues seen at funeral homes and the body bags seen coming out of crowded hospitals. The country has also stopped reported COVID fatalities data since January 9.
Officials said in December they planned to issue monthly, rather than daily updates, going forward.
Although international health experts have predicted at least 1 million COVID-related deaths this year, China has reported just over 5,000 since the pandemic began, one of the lowest death rates in the world.
Concerns over data transparency were among the factors that prompted more than a dozen countries to demand pre-departure COVID tests from travellers arriving from China.
Beijing, which had shut its borders from the rest of the world for three years and still demands all visitors get tested before their trip, has said it strongly opposes such curbs, which it finds "discriminatory" and "unscientific."
Tensions escalated early January across South Korea and Japan after China retaliated by suspending short-term visas for the countries' nationals. The two countries also limit flights, test travellers from China on arrival, and quarantine the positive ones.
Also Read | China halts short-term visas in South Korea, first response to COVID curbs
Chinese state media on January 11 defended the retaliatory measures against South Korea and Japan over their COVID-19 travel curbs as "reasonable", while Chinese tourists decried Seoul's "insulting" treatment on social media.
Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on January 13 that Tokyo will continue to ask China to be transparent about its outbreak, labelling Beijing's retaliation as one-sided, unrelated to COVID, and extremely "regrettable."
With inputs from agencies
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