CHINA has reported no new domestic cases of the deadly coronavirus for a third consecutive day.

But the nation on Saturday confirmed the highest yet increase in infections imported from abroad.

The rate of infection in China has been on  a downward curve for weeks while the rest of the world steps up measures to try and battle the pandemic. 

All 41 of new confirmed cases in China were imported from overseas, the country's National Health Commission said , bringing the total number of such cases to 269. There were no locally transmitted cases, for the third consecutive day.

The World Health Organization on Friday praised China's success in controlling the outbreak in the central city of Wuhan, where the virus first emerged late last year.

When China announced it was shutting down Wuhan, the centre of the coronavirus outbreak, in a bid to prevent further spread of the disease, the world was stunned and some experts were sceptical.

Quarantine had never been tried on such an enormous scale.

Some 56m people in Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province underwent the lockdown in late January, but authorities there are reportedly progressively easing the travel restrictions as cases have dwindled.

The Herald: Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus

"Wuhan provides hope for the rest of the world that even the most severe situation can be turned around," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in Geneva on Friday.

“Of course, we must exercise caution; the situation can reverse. But the experience of cities and countries that have pushed back this coronavirus gives hope and courage to the rest of the world.”

China anounced on Thursday that for the first time since the coronavirus outbreak started, it had no local transmissions of Covid-19, a major milestone in the country’s fight against the pandemic.

But China is now having to step up  controls to tackle infections brought in from other countries, with another 41 cases reported Saturday - the highest one-day tally yet.

Beijing and Shanghai were the main entry points for the returnees, many of whom are students studying abroad, according to official reports. They have come back after many campuses in the United States and Europe shut down to stem rapidly rising infection rates there.

Also returning in a flight to safety were China-based expats, as businesses begin to reopen.

While there is no reported transmission of the virus from people arriving from abroad to local communities, authorities across China are tightening public health measures as imported cases rose for a third day nationwide.

Beijing and other regions are forcing international arrivals to go into a 14-day quarantine, while the civil aviation ministry said it would limit passenger numbers on inbound international flights.

There have been over 81,000 cases in China, but the health commission said only 6,013 were still ill with the disease.

The number of deaths has also slowed, with seven new fatalities reported Saturday, all in Hubei province.

China's death toll - now at 3,255 - was overtaken this week by Italy, where more than 4,000 people have now died.

The lack of locally transmitted cases comes as officials relaxed restrictions, even in the virus epicenter of Wuhan, which was responsible for all seven new deaths.

City officials said last week that residents could walk around their compounds, loosening restrictions that had kept them to their personal living areas.

On Saturday, the official Xinhua news agency said commercial outlets in residential communities and villages without existing cases of virus can resume business, citing the municipal bureau of commerce.

The eastern city of Hangzhou, where internet giant Alibaba has its headquarters, said on Saturday that it will allow cinemas, libraries and museums to open, and will stop measuring people's temperatures at hotels, subway stations and office buildings.

The first phase of a clinical trial of a vaccine has kicked off, state-backed Science and Technology Daily reported on Saturday.

The first batch of 36 volunteers, comprising Wuhan residents aged between 18 and 60, will undergo a 14-day quarantine at a centralized location.

On Thursday, China’s national health commission said there were 34 new cases, but all were recent overseas arrivals. In Hubei, the Chinese province where the outbreak began, there were no new cases of any kind during Wednesday.

It was on Hogmanay that the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) China office heard the first reports of a previously-unknown virus behind a number of pneumonia cases in Wuhan, a city in Eastern China with a population of over 11 million.

What started as an epidemic mainly limited to China has now become a  global pandemic.

Mr Ghebreyesus said the WHO's greatest worry was the impact that the virus could have if it took hold in countries with weaker health systems or more vulnerable populations.

“That concern has now become very real and urgent,” he said, but added that significant sickness and loss of life in such countries was not inevitable.

“Unlike any pandemic in history, we have the power to change the way this goes,” he said.

Tedros said that although older people had been the hardest hit by the disease, younger people were not spared, saying they made up many of the sufferers needing hospital treatment.

He said solidarity between the generations was one of the keys to defeating the spread of the pandemic.

The Herald: These are the symptoms of coronavirus (Photo WHO)

“ I have a message for young people: you are not invincible. This virus could put you in hospital for weeks — or even kill you,” Tedros warned.

“Even if you don't get sick, the choices you make about where you go could be the difference between life and death for someone else.

“I'm grateful that so many young people are spreading the word and not the virus.”

WHO emergencies director, Michael Ryan said that two out of three people in intensive care in badly-hit Italy were aged under 70.

The WHO also said it was now using the term “physical distancing” rather than “social distancing” to describe the need to maintain space between people to avoid the virus passing.

Although people may need to go into physical isolation, they did not need to become socially isolated, he said, adding it was important to maintain good mental health during the crisis.

“We can keep connected in many ways without physically being in the same space,” said Maria Van Kerkhove, who heads the WHO's emerging diseases unit.

“We want people to still remain connected.”