China still faces the "big challenge" of a potential second wave of Covid-19 infections, the country's top respiratory authority has warned, with the lack of immunity among the community a serious concern as the race to develop a vaccine continues.
While [Dr. Zhong Nanshan] acknowledged that the number of infections were initially under reported in Wuhan, he rejected accusations that China's official statistics remained unreliable even after the central government took control of the country's coronavirus response in late January.
With the number of coronavirus deaths surpassing 87,000 in the US, President Donald Trump has publicly questioned the accuracy of China's death toll.
But Zhong said the Chinese government had learned lessons from SARS 17 years ago, when it covered up "some of the outbreak... for two or three months."
This time, he said, the central government announced that "all the cities, all the government departments, should report the true number of diseases -- so if you do not do that, you will be punished."