Introduction
In late December 2019, clusters of patients with pneumonia of unknown
etiology were reported in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China(Lu et al., 2020).
The causative agent has been identified as a novel coronavirus,
currently known as SARS-CoV-2, which likely originated from bats,
according to the gene sequence(Xu et al., 2020; Zhou et al., 2020). The
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was of clustering onset(Chen et al.,
2020; Li et al., 2020; Yu et al., 2020), and the estimated basic
reproductive number R0 ranges from 2.0-4.0(J. T. Wu et al., 2020; Li et
al., 2020; Y. Yang et al., 2020; Yu et al., 2020). Complications like
acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) and cytokine storm might be
the reason of high intensive care admission rate and death(Huang et al.,
2020). The outbreak of COVID-19 has led to a public health emergency of
international concern declared by World Health Organization (WHO) on
January 30, 2020.
China was confronted with multitude challenges in controlling this
highly contagious previously unknown disease. The unprecedented pressure
posed on the health care system by the exponential patient growth has
caused severe shortage of medical resources in Wuhan and even Hubei
Province, the epicenter of the outbreak. And coincidentally, the virus
strike happened around the Chinese New Year, a traditional national
holiday when millions of Chinese migrate in the country. The virus thus
began to spread across the country.
The first-level response to public health emergency in China was
promptly started in the nation. The timely and forceful Joint Prevention
and Control Mechanism initiated by the State Council, have effectively
curbed the spread of the COVID-19 in Wuhan and all of Mainland China.
As of March 26, 2020, there are globally 509,164 confirmed COVID-19
cases (46,484 new) in 199 countries/ territories, with 54 news in
Mainland China and 46,367 news outside of China. WHO reported that the
outbreak of COVID-19 has become a global pandemic, and in fact, COVID-19
is accelerating its spread around the world. Although countries face
different stages of epidemic and have different levels of health care,
the world is facing the same challenges. This study aimed to explore the
change patterns of prevalence and death toll in Mainland China, and more
important, to share the measures and China’s experience to contain the
COVID-19.