China is still facing a major outbreak across the country.
A local health department in Central China’s Henan Province said that as of Jan. 6, about 90 percent of the province was infected with COVID-19.
That means over 88 million people are infected. That’s about the same as the populations of California, Texas, and Florida combined—the three most populous US states.
It’s the first time since China lifted lockdowns that an official health department admitted the outbreak has reached this scale.
Wu Zunyou, the chief epidemiologist of China’s Communist Party, admitted that when the number of COVID-19 cases in China reached a certain scale—it became possible for mutant strains to emerge.