January 29 coronavirus news

British Airways has suspended all flights into and out of mainland China, the airline announced on Wednesday.

The decision by British Airways comes as countries step up efforts against the novel coronavirus, which began in Wuhan, China, and has spread globally.

Read the full British Airways statement:

US airlines: United Airlines also announced Tuesday that it will temporarily reduce its schedule between the US and three Chinese cities -- Beijing, Hong Kong and Shanghai.

An airline industry official told CNN that Trump administration officials briefed US airlines Tuesday on measures being taken. In discussions, the White House mentioned the possibility of banning flights to China, but said they are not now issuing such a ban.

The administration would evaluate the situation daily to determine whether more measures need to be taken, the official said.

The Chinese embassy in Denmark has blasted one of the country's top newspapers for a cartoon about the Wuhan coronavirus that riffed on China's national flag.

The cartoon, published in Jyllands-Posten on Monday, showed the red flag with its yellow stars replaced by virus molecules.

In a statement published online, an embassy spokesperson said the drawing was "an insult to China and hurts the feelings of the Chinese people."

According to Agence France-Presse, Jyllands-Posten's chief editor Jacob Nybroe said the paper would not "dream of" poking fun at the dire situation the virus has caused in China, but refused to apologize "for something we don't think is wrong."

"We have no intention of being demeaning or to mock, nor do we think that the drawing does," Nybroe said. "As far as I can see, this here is about different forms of cultural understanding."

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen was quoted by the Politiken newspaper as saying "we have freedom of expression in Denmark. Also to draw".

Jyllands-Posten is no stranger to cartoon controversy. In 2005, it published depictions of the Prophet Mohammed deemed offensive by many Muslims, including one showing the founder of Islam wearing a bomb as a turban. The paper apologized, but the cartoons were seized upon by radical preachers in the Middle East and sparked several riots and attacks on Danish embassies in the region.

T coronavirus outbreak began in Wuhan, China, and has now spread across Asia and the rest of the world.

Today, Chinese authorities continue to try and contain the virus' spread, while other countries evacuate their citizens from Wuhan. All the while, researchers are racing to learn more about the virus and develop a vaccine.

Here are the latest updates:

So what's being done? And what can I do?

This post has been updated to reflect the status of a suspected case in Tibet.

The flight carrying more than 200 US citizens from Wuhan, China has landed in Anchorage, Alaska, according to CNN affiliate KTUU and global aviation tracking site FlightAware.

The Kalitta Air plane is at a gate, and there are several people in contamination suits on the ground below the plane. 

The plane will refuel in Anchorage before continuing on to a military base in California. It had originally been scheduled to land in a civilian airport in California, but the destination change was announced Tuesday night US time.

During the refuel stop, the passengers will also go through health screenings to check for symptoms of the novel coronavirus symptoms, Alaskan officials said.

Since the outbreak of the Wuhan coronavirus became international news and a national panic across China, with millions placed under lockdown and travel restrictions and screenings put in place across the country, the city's mayor, Zhou Xianwang, has been prominent in state media coverage of the crisis.

While this could be seen as positive for Zhou, a sign of the central government's faith in him and his leadership on the ground -- it's likely the opposite. His appearances have all come since the central government and President Xi Jinping seized control of the crisis, and after intense criticism of him and other Hubei provincial officials' handling of the initial outbreak online and in state media.

In an interview last week, Zhou admitted that the city's warnings were "not sufficient." That followed revelations that Wuhan leaders had gone ahead with a world record pot luck dinner attempt involving 40,000 families, and had held a provincial Party congress after the first cases of the virus were detected.

Zhou has defended his decision-making somewhat, explaining that he did not know the situation was so serious, but recent findings have suggested that there was evidence of human-to-human transmission of the virus earlier than previously claimed, and Hubei has been criticized for not instituting screening until January 14.

"As for the late disclosure, I hope the public can understand that it's an infectious disease, and relevant information should be released according to the law. As a local government, we can only disclose information after being authorized."

He admitted that should they fail to contain the virus, Wuhan officials "might leave a bad name in history," and offered to resign.

"If it's conducive to the control of the virus and the protection of the safety of the people, Ma Guoqiang (the Party chief of Wuhan) and I can shoulder whatever responsibilities," he told CCTV. "We would like to be removed from the office to appease public indignation."

It's likely too early for Zhou and Ma's scalps to be politically useful, however. Were they to be fired now, any further crises down the line would fall directly on the shoulders of the central government and President Xi himself.

Faced with numerous other issues both at home and abroad, Xi can ill afford being blamed for the Wuhan outbreak, and may decide it's more useful to keep two obvious fall guys front and center in the public's imagination to soak up the opprobrium. With the virus expected to continue spreading for several months though, there will likely be more than enough to go around.

The outbreak of the Wuhan coronavirus has infected thousands and spread overseas. The world has never had more advanced medical science, but it's also never been so interconnected. So what can be done to stop it from becoming a global epidemic?

Early stages: There's still plenty we don't know about the virus but Chinese authorities believe that it is spreading from human to human, and that people can be infected before symptoms show.

How bad is it? The vast majority of cases so far have not been fatal, with a mortality rate of about 2.3%. But a large proportion of cases are considered "severe" and very few people have been released from hospital.

How are doctors treating it? There are no specific treatments for coronaviruses -- but just like the common cold, doctors can treat the symptoms. Keeping patients isolated in hospital also prevents them from infecting others.

What else can doctors do? The way to stop an outbreak is to work out who a patient has had contact with, and try to stop them from spreading the virus. If those contacts show symptoms, they are immediately tested and their contacts will need to be traced.

What about travel bans? Chinese authorities have shut down transport in and out of Wuhan and at least 10 other cities, effectively quarantining millions of people.

What can the public do? Experts have advised people use face masks as a precaution, even though it's still unclear how the virus is spread or whether masks would stop it. Experts also recommend washing hands with soap and water, sneezing into your elbow, and informing people about what to look out for.

Read the full story here.

As cases of the coronavirus continue to rise in China and abroad, people are flocking to stores to buy supplies and food.

With many schools and businesses in the region closing for the next few weeks, residents may be looking to hunker down at home to avoid infection. In one Hong Kong supermarket, shelves were mostly empty on Tuesday, soon after the city government announced increased measures to restrict the disease's spread.

Face masks sold out: It's not just Asia, either -- in medical supply stores in central Texas are experiencing a medical mask shortage after a Texas A&M student, having recently traveled to Wuhan, China, may have contracted coronavirus.

There have been reports of face masks being sold out in cities across China, with some residents being mailed boxes of masks from relatives abroad.

Wuhan hospitals are also running low on medical supplies as they struggle to cope with the sheer number of patients. Chinese authorities said this week they were sending additional personnel and supplies to assist.

Much is still unknown about the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, and health officials are urging vigilance.

That means travelers crisscrossing the globe should be aware of the virus, steer clear of heavily impacted areas and exercise some of the same kinds of preventive measures they'd use to avoid influenza and other illnesses.

But how worried should travelers outside the most impacted areas be about the Wuhan coronavirus?

In this era of global travel, you can never say the risk is zero of being exposed to something, says Dr. Yoko Furuya, associate professor of medicine in the division of infectious diseases at Columbia University Irving Medical Center.

But most of the cases so far have involved Wuhan and surrounding cities in Hubei Province.

It's not a big concern for US travelers traveling domestically, says Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of medicine in Vanderbilt University's division of infectious diseases.

Travelers heading to China should be more concerned, he adds.

"As a matter of fact, I have heard colleagues say to a patient or two, 'Gee, do you have to go to China right now? Why don't you wait a little bit?'"

People who have traveled to Wuhan in the last few weeks and are feeling sick with fever, cough or are having difficulty breathing should seek medical attention right away and call ahead to inform providers of recent travel and symptoms, according to CDC guidelines.

The Wuhan coronavirus has sparked fears of a new global epidemic, as it spreads across Asia and around the world.

For those in China and Hong Kong, it's particularly reminiscent of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak that killed 774 people in 2003, more than 280 of them in Hong Kong.

Rapid spread: This novel coronavirus now has more confirmed cases that SARS did, suggesting it is spreading more rapidly -- which could be due to it being more contagious, or China being more interconnected than 2003.

Mortality: The coronavirus is far less deadly than SARS, or Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS). The coronavirus' mortality rate is around 2.2%, compared to around 10% for SARS and 34% for MERS.

Instead, the coronavirus appears to be about as deadly as seasonal influenza, which claims the lives of thousands of people every year. A 2019 study by Chinese scientists showed that influenza in China has a mortality rate of 1.6% to 2.6%.

However, the mortality rate for the coronavirus may continue to change as more cases and possible deaths develop.