China has recently announced zero new cases and death tolls since coronavirus started in Wuhan last December. This report sparks a glimmer of hope for all COVID-19 stricken countries. However, new reports reveal that this is probably false.
The Chinese government said that there are about 2,535 people who died in Wuhan because of coronavirus. Their recent announcement to lift the lockdown since January comes with the report that it has hit zero new cases. In fact, they have reached out to other countries to send medical supplies and assist them in containing the virus.
But despite this good news, some people are still sceptical of the accuracy of this tally because of Wuhan's overwhelmed medical system. Another thing, it is also known that the Chinese authorities had been trying to conceal the correct statistics at the beginning of the outbreak. There were also multiple revisions on how to count the official cases. Knowing that there was secrecy of the real occurrence in Wuhan, residents had been posting in social media as the call for disciplinary action against the area's top officials.
According to Bloomberg, stacks of urns are found in Wuhan which would relay a different message from what China said about their number of casualties. A post on Chinese social media site Weibo says that the more accurate way of counting the deceased is by determining the number of cremations in seven crematoriums in Wuhan.
Thousands of urns spotted
Families of those people who were cremated after they succumbed to the virus were allowed to pick up the ashes of their loved ones. Starting this week, people are seen lining up in crematoriums, while still observing social distancing, to withdraw their loved one's ashes. Because of the long lines, families need to wait for several hours before they can claim the urn.
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Chinese media outlet Caixin reports about relatives lining up to receive ashes from Hankou funeral home. Outside, trucks ship about 2,500 urns in two days. Another picture shows 3,500 urns stacked in the crematoriums Jingy Hall. But since this is a storage room, it is still unclear how many of the urns had been filled.
Discrepancy in numbers
Reports indicate that there are two possible reasons why the exact number of urns are not revealed- the eight Wuhan funeral homes may not have the data or they were not allowed to disclose it.
It is also possible that not all COVID-19 cases are recorded since not everyone was tested. Some people may have died from the virus but were not included since it wasn't confirmed that they succumbed to COVID-19. Aside from that, some patients died due because they were not treated in the hospitals as medical workers were occupied dealing with coronavirus patients. For these reason, it's could have resulted to a discrepancy in China's tally.
According to Wuhan government's data, there were 56,007 cremations in Wuhan in the fourth quarter of 2019.. This is 1,583 higher than the recorded number in the fourth quarter of 2018 and 2,231 higher than the cremations in the fourth quarter of 2017.
Related article: China Reportedly Cremates Alive COVID-19 Patients
