China death toll revised up

The official death toll in Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic, now stands at 3,869—a 50 percent increase from initial reports. Wuhan’s coronavirus headquarters blamed the undercount on deaths at home and at medical institutions outside its network. The revision, released Friday, raises China’s official total death toll to 4,632. Experts say Chinese officials are likely underreporting the number of deaths in the pandemic.

How is China recovering? Business operations are slowly resuming across the country. Official data released on Friday revealed that the Chinese economy shrank by 6.8 percent in the first quarter over last year. It’s the largest drop since 1967 during the first years of the Cultural Revolution, according to Iris Pang of ING.

Dig deeper: Read June Cheng’s report on earlier speculations about China’s real death toll.