Click here to subscribe to our newsletter.

"We might be young and some of us might be worried... but when we put on our uniforms, the worries go away". 

That's what one nurse in Wuhan told CGTN, as we visited a hospital at the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak. 

France is the only European country to confirm cases of the virus, but UK health minister Matt Hancock today told citizens who have recently traveled to Wuhan to 'self-isolate'. 

Today we also heard from Jonathan Ball, professor of virology at the University of Nottingham, about how the illness is spreading, and how it can be stopped. 

You can read that interview in today's email. 

German business confidence dropped in January, counter to expectations. The Munich-based Ifo Institute measures the feeling among 9,000 businesses each month and discovered a drop in January which put a stop to the hopes of a recovery. 

In today's graph, we show how different sectors and the overall outlook have differed over the past year. 

Finally, under pressure airplane manufacturer Boeing will be hoping its fortunes are about to change, as it began testing on its new airliner the 777X this weekend. It will be a year before its put into production, but executives will be sure to watch testing results with bated breath.  

Happy reading,

Patrick Atack
Digital business correspondent 

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has warned the UK it risks undermining its sovereignty if Huawei is allowed to become part of its 5G network.

Senior Chinese officials from the National Health Commission and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology called for a return to pre-holiday levels of production of medical supplies to meet the needs of those at the center of the coronavirus epidemic.

Shares in Japanese tourism-linked businesses fell as China's ban on outbound package holidays came into effect. Tokyo Disney Resort was among the losers. 

Renault is planning to name former Volkswagen executive Luca de Meo as its new CEO, as the French carmaker aims to move on from the Carlos Ghosn scandal.  

The UK retail sector has lost nearly 10,000 jobs in 2020 already, according to the Centre for Retail Research, as shops struggle after a downbeat Christmas period. 

Lundin Petroleum, one of Europe's largest independent oil producers, says it will become "carbon neutral" by the end of the decade and will drop "petroleum" from its name.    

Across European markets, the British FTSE 100, German Dax, French Cac 40, and Euro Stoxx 50 have all closed more than 2% down. 

Watch: CGTN's Nawied Jabarkhyl visited the Centre of Excellence for Research on Avian Diseases to find out how the global poultry business is affected by diseases such as swine or avian flu.  

Jonathan Ball, professor of virology from the University of Nottingham, spoke to CGTN about the difficulties of containing a virus, such as a coronavirus. 

Just how much of a challenge is it to prevent the spread and potentially contain this virus? 

It does seem to be getting more difficult as time progresses. This time last week, we were fairly confident that it would be akin to the size of the SARs outbreak of 2002, where standard infection control measures,  identifying infected individuals and isolating them and trace their contacts. That whole process brings outbreaks to an end.

Now, unfortunately, at the moment, there does seem to be increasing reports, particularly in China, of the potential for individuals who are showing no signs of outward infection, no symptoms, to be spreading the virus. So we need to get a handle on just how big a problem that might be. 

And is that what makes it so challenging, the fact that it potentially is difficult to spot? 

Exactly. If you don't know who's infected with the virus, then how can you deal with it? You can't isolate them. They themselves sometimes aren't even aware that they're transmitting the virus to other people.

We've also heard over the weekend that the be the incubation period for the virus might be as many as 14 days. And during that period of incubation, again, the person appears healthy. They have no outward signs of infection.

But again, there's evidence that they might be transmitting the virus. So it is a very complex picture. And identifying this kind of silent transmitter is going to be very difficult. It's important to understand just how much these sorts of infections are contributing to the overall epidemic, an outbreak to understand just how much it will impact on the overall control measures being used and what are the prospects for the creation of a potential vaccine.

Unfortunately, the pathway to a vaccine is a lengthy one and we understood what this virus was, around a week ago, and therefore there will be efforts to try and mobilize vaccine development.

But because it takes several months, if not a couple of years, we're not going to see a vaccine certainly in the immediate future. 

And what about treating those who have contracted the disease? What is the most effective way of doing that?

In terms of treatments, the people who have very mild symptoms, that the people with mild symptoms will think that they've just got a normal cold or flu-like virus. And again, that's part of the challenge with infection control.

But unfortunately, some individuals will go on to develop severe disease like pneumonia and ultimately might die. We do know that there are certain groups that are potentially more at risk from developing severe symptoms, particularly people with things like heart disease or asthma or diabetes, but also the elderly. There are also severe cases in people are relatively young and previously fit and healthy. 

And just how serious is coronavirus? Are we under threat of it becoming a pandemic?

I think as the story has evolved, and as the data has been emerging over the past few days, and given the fact that we now seem to think that there may be a silent spread of the virus, I think the risk of this virus turning into a pandemic is great.

Manufacturing and trade sectors are both showing upswings after periods of negativity in 2019, but construction fell to its lowest level since June 2018, according to Clemens Fuest, ifo Institute president. 

Overall, the German economy is said to be in a cautious mood looking ahead to 2020.