Earlier this week the WHO announced that COVID-19 would be the name for the disease caused by the coronavirus. On Wednesday, China announced 14,840 new cases of the coronavirus after changing the way cases are confirmed to include where a test was negative but other methods such as symptoms and x-rays show evidence of the virus. The WHO has asked for “further clarity” regarding this change in policy. There have now been over 64,000 confirmed cases of the coronavirus and 1,383 deaths. There have been fifteen confirmed cases in the United States, including an individual quarantined at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland. A bipartisan letter to U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar asks for guidelines to receive federal reimbursement for costs state and local governments are incurring in response to the coronavirus outbreak.
On Thursday, Japan reported its first fatality resulting from the coronavirus. Japan has had 247 confirmed cases. Singapore has also announced eight additional cases, bringing its total to 58 cases of the coronavirus.
The CDC announced that some of the testing kits provided to stat laboratories were flawed and will need to be replaced. The agency had begun to ship testing kits to labs in the U.S. and more than 30 countries last week. In an interview, CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield stated that there will be new cases and “we’re probably going to see human-to-human transmission within the United States.”
The Health Law Pulse will continue to provide updates as more is known about this public health crisis.
