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Beijing, Mar 12: The number of fresh infections at the epicentre of China's coronavirus epidemic dropped to a new low on Thursday but the country imported more cases from abroad.

Another 11 people died, the lowest daily increase since late January, bringing the toll in China to 3,169 deaths, according to the National Health Commission.

There were only eight new cases in Wuhan, the city where the virus first emerged in December before growing into a national crisis and a pandemic.

It is the first time that new cases in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province, have fallen to single-digits since figures started to be reported in January.

With cases falling dramatically in recent weeks, authorities this week began to loosen some restrictions on Hubei's 56 million people, who have been under quarantine since late January.

Healthy people living in low-risk areas of the province can now travel within Hubei. While Wuhan is not included, some of the city's companies were told they could resume work.

Only one other non-imported case was recorded elsewhere in the country.

But as global hotspots emerge elsewhere, China fears that cases arriving from abroad could undermine its progress.

On Thursday there were six more imported cases reported, bringing the total of infections from overseas to 85, health officials said.

Beijing has ordered a 14-day quarantine for everyone arriving in the city from any country.

Travellers flying into Beijing Capital International Airport from high-risk countries are now handled separately from other passengers.

A total of 80,793 people have now been infected in China.

President Xi Jinping said this week during his first visit to Wuhan since the crisis erupted that the spread of the disease has been "basically curbed" in China.

Geneva, Mar 12: For the global economy, virus repercussions were profound, with increasing concerns of wealth- and job-wrecking recessions. U.S. stocks wiped out more than all the gains from a huge rally a day earlier as Wall Street continued to reel.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1,464 points, bringing it 20% below its record set last month and putting it in what Wall Street calls a “bear market.” The broader S&P 500 is just 1 percentage point away from falling into bear territory and bringing to an end one of the greatest runs in Wall Street’s history.

WHO officials said they thought long and hard about labeling the crisis a pandemic — defined as sustained outbreaks in multiple regions of the world.

The risk of employing the term, Ryan said, is “if people use it as an excuse to give up.” But the benefit is “potentially of galvanizing the world to fight.”

Underscoring the mounting challenge: soaring numbers in the U.S. and Europe’s status as the new epicenter of the pandemic. While Italy exceeds 12,000 cases and the United States has topped 1,300, China reported a record low of just 15 new cases Thursday and three-fourths of its infected patients have recovered.

China’s totals of 80,793 cases and 3,169 deaths are a shrinking portion of the world’s more than 126,000 infections and 4,600 deaths.

“If you want to be blunt, Europe is the new China,” said Robert Redfield, the head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

With 12,462 cases and 827 deaths, Italy said all shops and businesses except pharmacies and grocery stores would be closed beginning Thursday and designated billions in financial relief to cushion economic shocks in its latest efforts to adjust to the fast-evolving crisis that silenced the usually bustling heart of the Catholic faith, St. Peter’s Square.