China’s National Health Commission said on Wednesday that nine people had died from a new coronavirus and 440 people across 13 Chinese provinces had been confirmed to be infected and warned that the still-unidentified virus could mutate.
The number of cases of the infection, known by its technical name 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), is greater than the total of more than 300 reported earlier on Tuesday.
The illness is transmitted via the respiratory tract and there "is the possibility of viral mutation and further spread of the disease," National Health Commission vice minister Li Bin said at a news conference in Beijing.
The World Health Organization is holding an emergency meeting later on Wednesday to determine whether to declare a rare global public health emergency over the disease, which has also been confirmed in the US, Taiwan, Thailand, Japan and South Korea.