Lockdown ends for Wuhan

The two-month Wuhan lockdown has ended, the local government announced last night, with people allowed to leave the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak once their applications are granted and with all roads in the city fully reopened.

The announcement came after the outbreak in Wuhan seems to have petered out,with the city reporting its fourth consecutive day without new cases yesterday.

Local authorities will give out health certificates after people test negative to the virus, and they will be allowed to leave.

People entering the city also need to notify the authorities, and those who are proved healthy will be allowed through control points once they have their temperature taken.

Public transport within the city will resume today, while all road blocks have been removed.

This came as the SAR government arranged a second batch of charter flights to bring stranded Hongkongers home. The flights are scheduled to set off on Wednesday and Thursday.

However, the fear for Hong Kong is that it has become a "transit point" for imported coronavirus cases in the mainland and Macau with at least eight confirmed cases involving people returning from overseas and stopping over in the SAR.

The mainland reported 46 new cases on Saturday, 45 of which were imported. Six of the cases in Shanghai and Guangdong had a travel history to Hong Kong.

The three cases in Guangdong included a 19-year-old Chinese man who took Cathay Pacific flight CX320 from Madrid, Spain to Hong Kong on March 10, and went back to Shenzhen via the Shenzhen Bay Port boundary crossing.

His body temperature was normal when he crossed the control point into Shenzhen, but he was later confirmed with the virus.

A Chinese woman, 23, took Singapore Airlines flight SQ321 from London to Singapore last Monday and arrived in Hong Kong two days later on flight SQ856. She then went through the Shenzhen Bay Port without showing symptoms, but developed diarrhea, a headache and a fever a day later. She was confirmed to be infected.

Another case, a 40-year-old British man, took British Airways flight BA1493 from Glasgow, Scotland, to Heathrow airport in London before catching BA027 to get here.

He then went to Shenzhen on Tuesday in his company's vehicle and went to Zhuhai a day later. He was confirmed to have contracted the virus while undergoing medical surveillance.

The other three confirmed cases in Shanghai who had been to Hong Kong included a couple from Zhejiang province who work in Spain.

They left Madrid on Tuesday and arrived at Shanghai Pudong airport the next day via Hong Kong. A Macau citizen also went to Shanghai two days after arriving in Hong Kong from London on Tuesday.

All three were quarantined upon arrival.

Meanwhile, Macau reported that a confirmed case as well as a suspected case both had a travel history through Hong Kong.