by Tyler Durden
Wed, 02/19/2020 - 04:4

Summary:

Death toll passes 2,000 as Hubei reports 132 deaths for Tuesday

Florida health officials mysteriously refuse to share virus info with reporters

Russia bars all Chinese from entering

NYT notes signs of impending economic distress

South Korea announces 15 new cases

* * *

Update (1300ET): In a landmark decision, Russia has temporarily banned Chinese from entry as of Feb. 20, becoming the first country to ban all Chinese from entry in response to the coronavirus outbreak, according to Russian news agency TASS.

This is only the latest step from Russia, which has already closed most entry points along its 4,200-kilometer border, suspended e-visas and work visas for Chinese nationals.

Russia has already reported two cases of coronavirus - the only cases confirmed in the country so far - both involving Chinese nationals.

Though there haven't been many cases, there have been a number of interesting virus-related headlines out of Russia in recent weeks. Two men in the city of Chelyabinsk were fined for hooliganism after they filmed a prank video where they pretended to shoot a man infected with the virus in a park. The men wore white hazmat suits and face masks while simulating the shooting of the third person, who wasn't actually infected.

— Russia discharged a Chinese national from the hospital in the Siberian city of Chita on Wednesday after he recovered from a coronavirus infection, the second of Russia's two confirmed cases of coronavirus to recover. The other victim, also a Chinese national, was also said by authorities to have recovered and been released from quarantine in Siberia's Tyumen region.

Meanwhile,apropos of nothing, BNO News shared one of the latest videos out of Hubei Province, which we'd like to now share with you.

Video from Hubei province shows doctors running across the street to take patients who are critically ill with coronavirus to a new ICU unit. It took 30 minutes per patient, 10 in total - Xinhua pic.twitter.com/16XLrYzB8l

— BNO Newsroom (@BNODesk) February 18, 2020

This could be an Olympic Sport (if they don't cancel the Olympics, that is).

As a handful of brave foreign correspondents continue to report on the outbreak inside mainland China, the Epoch Times' reporter Jennifer Zeng revealed on Tuesday that 71 people from one workplace in Beijing have been placed under quarantine after one employee was infected by COVID-19.

Much more on link