Wuhan, China, where the coronavirus epidemic emerged in December, resumed train services Saturday after months of lockdown.
Authorities reduced the city’s virus risk evaluation from high to medium.
Commuters riding on six metro lines in the Hubei provincial capital, with a population of 11 million people, were required to have their body temperatures checked before entering metro stations. They were also required to sit in between empty seats, Chinese state television reported.
As of Saturday, China confirmed a total of 45 new cases of the coronavirus disease, 44 of whom were people coming from overseas, the National Health Commission said Sunday.
Hubei reported five deaths and 28 new suspected infections Saturday, the commission said. No new confirmed case was reported in Wuhan.
The overall number of confirmed cases in China reached 81,439 by Saturday, with 2,691 patients still being treated, 75,448 patients discharged upon recovery, and 3,300 people who died of the disease.
Hong Kong confirmed 582 cases, including four deaths; Taiwan confirmed 283, including two deaths; and Macao reported 37 cases and no deaths.
South Korea reported 146 more cases infected with the coronavirus, bringing the total number to 9,478 as of midnight Saturday. The death toll rose to 144. More than 4,800 patients have fully recovered, and they were discharged from quarantine.
The number of infections in Japan passed 1,500 and the death toll was more than 50 as of Friday night, with the capital Tokyo having the most cases of COVID-19 in the country.
Thailand had 143 new coronavirus cases as of Sunday, bringing the overall cases to 1,388, a spokesman of the government's Center for COVID-19 Situation Administration said at the latest daily briefing. The country also recorded one new death, for a total of seven, since the outbreak.
New Zealand reported its first victim of the new coronavirus on Sunday, a woman in her 70s.
