Coronavirus Outbreak: India's Biggest Military Aircraft To Evacuate More Indians From China's Wuhan

The C-17 Globemaster, the biggest military aircraft in the Air Force, will carry a large consignment of medical supplies to China and bring back more Indians from Wuhan, the epicentre of the Coronavirus epidemic.

India will also send medicines as well as other medical supplies to China. (File Photo/ Getty)

New Delhi: In order to evacuate more Indians from Coronavirus-hit China and provide medical supplies to the country, the government of India will send a C-17 military aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) to Wuhan on February 20. According to sources close to news agency PTI, the C-17 Globemaster, the biggest military aircraft in the Air Force, will carry a large consignment of medical supplies to China and bring back more Indians from Wuhan, the epicentre of the Coronavirus epidemic. As off now, the government has evacuated over 640 Indians from China by sending two Air India planes earlier this month. A total of 647 Indians and seven Maldivians were brought back from Wuhan on February 1-2 in two 747 Boeing Air India aircraft after the outbreak of the novel Coronavirus. They were kept at two quarantine facilities in and around Delhi. Last week, India had announced that it will send medicines as well as other medical supplies to China. ALSO WATCH | Why China Is Arresting Its Own People Amid COVID-19 Outbreak? Meanwhile, Chinese Ambassador Sun Weidong has appreciated India for extending solidarity and expressing readiness to assist China to deal with the epidemic. He also said there is no case of infection as of today among the remaining Indians in Hubei province, the epicentre of the epidemic, and authorities are taking "good care" of them. So far in India, 317 people out of total 406 have left the ITBP centre after being declared free of novel Coronavirus by the doctors. All those who were discharged have been provided with conveyance till airport, railway stations, or bus stands. On Monday, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan had also visited the ITBP facility and interacted with the evacuees. India has so far reported three confirmed cases of the virus, all in Kerala.  Two of the three medical students who had tested positive for novel coronavirus infection have now been discharged, Vardhan said on Monday. China's National Health Commission on Tuesday said the death toll due to the outbreak climbed to 1,868 on Monday while the total number of confirmed cases jumped to 72,436. Chinese health authority on Tuesday said it received reports of 1,886 new confirmed cases of novel coronavirus infection and 98 deaths on Monday from 31 provincial-level regions and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps. Among the deaths, 93 were in Hubei Province, three in Henan, and one in Hebei and Hunan respectively.