Tens of thousands of people left Wuhan on Wednesday after a 76-day travel ban was lifted on the Chinese city where the coronavirus first emerged.
Previously quiet train and bus stations bustled as an exodus began from the city of 11 million, with some passengers wearing hazmat suits.
Up to 55,000 people are expected to leave Wuhan on Wednesday just by train, according to government estimates.
Steady streams of cars hit the road Wednesday morning, with barricades on the city's outskirts dismantled after the ban on outbound travel was lifted at midnight.
Ferries, trams and taxis resumed operations and the airport also opened again for domestic flights, with queueing passengers in protective wear wheeling cases and staff spraying disinfectant on the floor.
State news agency Xinhua said there would be around 200 flights on Wednesday.
A group of medics leaving Wuhan tearfully hugged colleagues from the city goodbye as they prepared to board flights home.
Wuhan led the world with an unprecedented quarantine lockdown on January 23 in a bid to stop the spread of the then-mysterious respiratory virus.
Chinese disease control officials said in January that the virus likely leapt from wildlife to humans at a Wuhan market that sold wild animals for food.
The rest of surrounding Hubei province quickly followed Wuhan, cutting tens of millions of people off from the world.
As the virus spread rapidly around the globe, around half of humanity has been forced into some form of lockdown.
Temperature checkpoints and posters telling workers in Wuhan to keep more than a metre apart at Japanese automaker Honda Motor Co's reopened plant in the Chinese city of Wuhan show how the coronavirus has created a new normal on the factory floor.
The plant, a Honda joint venture with Dongfeng Motor Group was shut in late January when authorities ordered a lockdown in Wuhan in a bid to snuff out the coronavirus, which emerged there late last year.
It reopened on March 11 to resume operations in stages and is now back to pre-virus production levels, Li Shiquan, assistant director of the joint venture's No. 2 final assembly plant, told reporters on Wednesday.
Shopping malls and the citys biggest shopping belt, the Chu River and Han street, reopened on March 30. Long queues, thanks to requirements that customers stand a metre apart, have formed at supermarkets while some residents have taken advantage of the warmer weather to resume their outdoor badminton games and dancing.
Wuhan has reported just three new confirmed infections in the past 21 days and only two in the past two weeks.
But even as Wuhan came back to life, new imported cases in the far northern province of Heilongjiang surged to a daily high of 25, fuelled by an influx of infected travellers crossing the border from Russia.
On Wednesday, Suifenhe city announced restrictions on the movement of citizens similar to the ones Wuhan has endured.
People must stay in their residential compounds and only one person per family can leave once every three days to buy necessities, and must return on the same day, state-run CCTV reported.
China is maintaining strict screening protocols, concerned about any resurgence in infections by virus carriers who exhibit no symptoms and infected travellers arriving from abroad.
China's new coronavirus cases doubled on Tuesday as the number of infected travellers from overseas surged, while new asymptomatic infections more than quadrupled.
New confirmed cases rose to 62 on Tuesday from 32 a day earlier, the National Health Commission said, the most since March 25. New imported infections accounted for 59 of the cases.
The number of new asymptomatic cases rose to 137 from 30 a day earlier, the health authority said on Wednesday, with incoming travellers accounting for 102 of the latest batch.
Authorities do not count asymptomatic cases in their tally of confirmed infections until patients show symptoms such as a fever or a cough. As of Tuesday, 1,095 asymptomatic patients were under medical observation, with 358 of them travellers arriving from abroad.
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
The Bio
Hometown: Bogota, Colombia
Favourite place to relax in UAE: the desert around Al Mleiha in Sharjah or the eastern mangroves in Abu Dhabi
The one book everyone should read: 100 Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It will make your mind fly
Favourite documentary: Chasing Coral by Jeff Orlowski. It's a good reality check about one of the most valued ecosystems for humanity
The specs
Engine: 4.0-litre flat-six
Torque: 450Nm at 6,100rpm
Transmission: 7-speed PDK auto or 6-speed manual
Fuel economy, combined: 13.8L/100km
On sale: Available to order now
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
F1 The Movie
Starring: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Rating: 4/5
The specs
Engine: 77.4kW all-wheel-drive dual motor
Power: 320bhp
Torque: 605Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh219,000
On sale: Now
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cylinder turbo
Power: 240hp at 5,500rpm
Torque: 390Nm at 3,000rpm
Transmission: eight-speed auto
Price: from Dh122,745
On sale: now
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
How to protect yourself when air quality drops
Install an air filter in your home.
Close your windows and turn on the AC.
Shower or bath after being outside.
Wear a face mask.
Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.
If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.
THE SPECS
Engine: 3.5-litre V6
Transmission: six-speed manual
Power: 325bhp
Torque: 370Nm
Speed: 0-100km/h 3.9 seconds
Price: Dh230,000
On sale: now
Fixtures
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Company%20profile
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Dr Amal Khalid Alias revealed a recent case of a woman with daughters, who specifically wanted a boy.
A semen analysis of the father showed abnormal sperm so the couple required IVF.
Out of 21 eggs collected, six were unused leaving 15 suitable for IVF.
A specific procedure was used, called intracytoplasmic sperm injection where a single sperm cell is inserted into the egg.
On day three of the process, 14 embryos were biopsied for gender selection.
The next day, a pre-implantation genetic report revealed four normal male embryos, three female and seven abnormal samples.
Day five of the treatment saw two male embryos transferred to the patient.
The woman recorded a positive pregnancy test two weeks later.
Tips to keep your car cool
- Place a sun reflector in your windshield when not driving
- Park in shaded or covered areas
- Add tint to windows
- Wrap your car to change the exterior colour
- Pick light interiors - choose colours such as beige and cream for seats and dashboard furniture
- Avoid leather interiors as these absorb more heat
In-demand jobs and monthly salaries
- Technology expert in robotics and automation: Dh20,000 to Dh40,000
- Energy engineer: Dh25,000 to Dh30,000
- Production engineer: Dh30,000 to Dh40,000
- Data-driven supply chain management professional: Dh30,000 to Dh50,000
- HR leader: Dh40,000 to Dh60,000
- Engineering leader: Dh30,000 to Dh55,000
- Project manager: Dh55,000 to Dh65,000
- Senior reservoir engineer: Dh40,000 to Dh55,000
- Senior drilling engineer: Dh38,000 to Dh46,000
- Senior process engineer: Dh28,000 to Dh38,000
- Senior maintenance engineer: Dh22,000 to Dh34,000
- Field engineer: Dh6,500 to Dh7,500
- Field supervisor: Dh9,000 to Dh12,000
- Field operator: Dh5,000 to Dh7,000
Buy farm-fresh food
The UAE is stepping up its game when it comes to platforms for local farms to show off and sell their produce.
In Dubai, visit Emirati Farmers Souq at The Pointe every Saturday from 8am to 2pm, which has produce from Al Ammar Farm, Omar Al Katri Farm, Hikarivege Vegetables, Rashed Farms and Al Khaleej Honey Trading, among others.
In Sharjah, the Aljada residential community will launch a new outdoor farmers’ market every Friday starting this weekend. Manbat will be held from 3pm to 8pm, and will host 30 farmers, local home-grown entrepreneurs and food stalls from the teams behind Badia Farms; Emirates Hydroponics Farms; Modern Organic Farm; Revolution Real; Astraea Farms; and Al Khaleej Food.
In Abu Dhabi, order farm produce from Food Crowd, an online grocery platform that supplies fresh and organic ingredients directly from farms such as Emirates Bio Farm, TFC, Armela Farms and mother company Al Dahra.
Coal Black Mornings
Brett Anderson
Little Brown Book Group
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
How to avoid crypto fraud
- Use unique usernames and passwords while enabling multi-factor authentication.
- Use an offline private key, a physical device that requires manual activation, whenever you access your wallet.
- Avoid suspicious social media ads promoting fraudulent schemes.
- Only invest in crypto projects that you fully understand.
- Critically assess whether a project’s promises or returns seem too good to be true.
- Only use reputable platforms that have a track record of strong regulatory compliance.
- Store funds in hardware wallets as opposed to online exchanges.
Company%20Profile
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