China has warned of an unidentified disease – with a “mortality rate higher than COVID-19” – is spreading rapidly in a Central Asian country.
Kazakhstan has denied claims by China’s embassy that a pneumonia outbreak more deadly than coronavirus is rampaging through the Central Asian country.
In an alert for Chinese citizens posted on the embassy’s website Thursday, Beijing warned of a disease with “a mortality rate far higher than COVID-19” – an assertion that was later removed from the statement.
It also said the pneumonia outbreak had caused 1772 deaths in the first half of 2020 and “628 in June alone”.
The statement originally referred to “Kazakhstan pneumonia” but this wording was later changed to “non-COVID pneumonia”.
