7 killed, 28 still trapped as hotel used as quarantine facility collapses in China

Beijing, Mar 08: Seven people were killed after a hotel used as a quarantine facility amid the coronavirus outbreak collapsed in south east China's Fujian province, official media reported on Sunday.

Around 71 people were trapped in the hotel that collapsed on Saturday in Quanzhou city of the province, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

The hotel was used to quarantine and observe people who had come to the province during the novel coronavirus prevention and control and had come in contact with the virus patients. Forty three people were pulled out from the debris out of which six were dead at the time of rescue, while one died later in hospital, it said.

Twenty eight people still remain trapped in the rubble. The Xinjia hotel, located in Licheng district of the city, was in operation since 2018 and had 80 rooms.

A preliminary investigation showed that the hotel was being decorated when the incident happened and the owner of the building has been put under police control, the Xinhua report said. Over 1,000 fire fighters, police officers and medics have been deployed to join the rescue work. The Ministry of Emergency Management has sent a work team to Quanzhou to help with the rescue and investigate the cause of the collapse.

The ministry has called for all-out efforts to rescue the victims and emphasized on the prevention of secondary disasters, while ensuring the safety of rescue teams. The novel virus originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year and has claimed over 3,000 lives in the country. Apart from China, over 3,400 people have died of the deadly disease and over 101,000 have been infected from the virus globally.