Moscow mayor says more than half of citizens diagnosed with Wuhan pneumonia

In an interview yesterday (29), Russian Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin mentioned that more than half of the city’s citizens (6 million people) have been infected with Wuhan pneumonia (novel coronavirus disease, COVID-19), but his statement differs more than six times from the official notification of 920,000. With the vaccination program in place and the Epidemic slowing down, Russia has now phased out some of its measures to prevent the outbreak.

In an interview with Russian television channel Rossiya-1 yesterday, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin revealed that more than half of the city’s 12 million citizens, or 6 million people, have been infected with Wuhan pneumonia, according to a foreign news report. The Moscow Times noted that Sobyanin’s statement was based on the city’s “analysis and research,” and that it differed more than six times from the cumulative number of confirmed cases officially reported.

Since the Wuhan pneumonia outbreak, Russian authorities have now reported the fourth highest cumulative number of confirmed cases in the world, according to Johns Hopkins University outbreak data, while Moscow has reported 925,359 confirmed cases, the highest in Russia, according to Russia’s Tass News Agency. Of these, 803,642 confirmed cases have recovered, while 13,300 have died.

Russian authorities noted that there were 19,032 new confirmed cases and 512 deaths in the last 24 hours, bringing the official total of deaths from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) to 72,697.

A total of 8.2 million doses of domestically produced vaccine have been manufactured in Russia, with medical facilities receiving 2.7 million of those doses and vaccination stations increasing from 2,250 to 3,100 in one week. As Russia’s vaccination program accelerates and based on the continued decline in the number of confirmed cases reported in Russia last week, Sobyanin this Wednesday (27) has lifted some of its measures to prevent the spread of the outbreak, including a closure policy that requires all for-profit businesses in the city to have 30 percent of their employees work at a distance and a curfew on restaurants. Russian authorities have also resumed air traffic with some countries and are expected to allow universities and colleges to resume normal classes on the 8th of next month.