Nearly 90% of people in Henan, China’s third most populous province, have now been infected with Covid-19, local health officials say.
Provincial official Kan Quancheng revealed the figure – which amounts to about 88.5 million people – at a press conference.
China is facing an unprecedented surge in cases after abandoning zero-Covid policies in December.
The move came after rare protests against lockdowns, quarantines and mass testing.
Kan did not specify a timeline for when all the infections occurred — but since China’s previous zero-Covid policy kept cases to a minimum, it is likely that the vast majority of Henan’s infections occurred in recent weeks.
He said visits to fever clinics in Henan province peaked on December 19 “after which it showed a continuous downward trend”.
The Henan province figures are in stark contrast to the central government’s Covid figures
According to official data, only 120,000 people in the country of 1.4 billion people have been infected and 30 have died since the policy change to Covid-19.
Meanwhile on Sunday, authorities reported three deaths from Covid in mainland China, one more than the day before.
Other local and provincial officials have also provided very different data from the central government.
On Christmas Eve, a senior health official in the port city of Qingdao reported that half a million people were being infected every day.
These “random” numbers were quickly removed from news reports.
