70 people trapped as China's coronavirus quarantining hotel collapses

Around 70 people were trapped after a hotel building housing quarantined coronavirus suspects collapsed in China’s Quanzhou city on Saturday (March 7), according to the official media in Beijing.

Thirty-three people were rescued after the 80-room hotel collapsed in Fujian Province at around 7.30 pm local time.

Around 70 people were trapped under the rubble, state-run Xinhua News agency reported.

The hotel was being used to quarantine and observe people who had come to the province during the novel coronavirus prevention and control, and had come in contact with the virus patients, the report said.

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A total of 147 rescue workers have been sent to the scene. Rescue efforts were underway.

The novel virus reportedly first originated in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December last year and has claimed over 3,500 lives globally.

The World Health Organisation last week raised the global virus risk to the maximum level after the outbreak spread to sub-Saharan Africa and stock markets around the world plummeted.