Chinese official says peak of coronavirus epidemic is over

The peak of the current outbreak of novel coronavirus disease, officially known as COVID-19, in China is over, a government spokesperson said here on Thursday.

New cases keep declining and the overall epidemic situation remains at a low level, Mi Feng, a spokesperson for the National Health Commission was quoted as addressing a press conference in Beijing by Xinhua news agency.

Mi said that the number of new cases in Wuhan, the epicenter in central China's Hubei Province, has dropped to a single digit, with only eight cases reported on Wednesday.

Only seven new cases were reported on the Chinese mainland outside Hubei, but six were imported from overseas.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the coronavirus outbreak, which has spread to at least 114 countries, a pandemic with Italy tightening its quarantine and the US imposing a ban on flights to Europe.

As President Donald Trump announced new measures to address the United States growing outbreak, Italy further tightened the nationwide quarantine it imposed across the country earlier this week - with all but essential services and shops to close for two weeks - after leaders from the European Union promised to do "whatever it takes" to tackle the coronavirus, which first emerged in China at the end of last year.

More than 126,000 have been infected globally, according to the WHO. Of those, over 68,000 have recovered, according to John Hopkins University, which is tracking the virus.