American woman dies in Wuhan
NEW YORK TIMES
People rush to buy necessities in Hong Kong on Thursday. Rumors of an impending toilet paper shortage due to the coronavirus outbreak incited Hong Kong residents to make a furious dash to stock up, despite little evidence supplies were running low.
An American citizen has died in Wuhan from the coronavirus outbreak, the New York Times reported.
The person who was around 60 years old died on Thursday, the paper said, citing a U.S. embassy statement. It appeared to be the first death of an American from the outbreak, the paper said. A Japanese man who was suspected of contracting the virus has also died in Wuhan, Japan’s foreign ministry said Saturday.
The death toll from the outbreak is inching closer to the total from SARS and may surpass the threshold today or tomorrow if the disease continues to kill people at its current pace. The global toll has reached 724 in about two months, while the 2002-2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, killed 774 people over a period that lasted about eight months.
Total deaths may be far higher, given reports of an overwhelmed health system in Hubei, central China. SARS also started in China and spread worldwide. In both cases the actual total may be higher when taking into account the underreporting of cases.
