Following the announcement of the lifting of measures in mainland China, 59,938 deaths occurred due to the virus between December 8, 2022 and January 12, 2023, the National Health Board said.
Ciao Yahui, Director of Medical Affairs of the Commission, stated that 5 thousand 503 patients lost their lives due to respiratory failure due to Kovid-19 infection, and 54 thousand 435 patients died due to complications related to chronic diseases such as cancer and cardiovascular diseases.
Ciao stated that the average age of the deceased was 80.3, and that 90 percent of them were people aged 65 and over.
China announced its death data for the first time after announcing that it would abandon the strict control and precautionary measures called “zero cases”.
Estimation is that more than 1 billion people will be infected
The National Health Committee had previously announced that it had stopped disclosing the number of incidents, patients and deaths on a daily basis, and announced that it would only count the deaths, whose primary cause of death was pneumonia and respiratory failure due to the virus, from Kovid-19, by introducing new standards in keeping death statistics.
China is facing the largest mass spread ever seen in a single country, with the number of incidents increasing rapidly in the country since it lifted measures at the beginning of last month. It is estimated that more than 1 billion people will be infected during the winter months in the country with a population of 1.4 billion.