Chinese Doctor Who Issued Early Warning On Coronavirus Dies.

Dr Li Wenliang, who was hailed a hero for raising the alarm about the coronavirus in the early days of the outbreak, has died of the infection.

His death was confirmed by the Wuhan hospital where he worked and was being treated, following conflicting reports about his condition on state media.

Dr Li, 34, tried to send a message to fellow medics about the outbreak at the end of December. Three days later police paid him a visit and told him to stop. He returned to work and caught the virus from a patient. He had been in hospital for at least three weeks.

He posted his story from his hospital bed last month on social media site Weibo.

"Hello everyone, this is Li Wenliang, an ophthalmologist at Wuhan Central Hospital," the post begins.

It was a stunning insight into the botched response by local authorities in Wuhan in the early weeks of the coronavirus outbreak.

Dr Li was working at the centre of the outbreak in December when he noticed seven cases of a virus that he thought looked like Sars - the virus that led to a global epidemic in 2003. The cases were thought to come from the Huanan Seafood market in Wuhan and the patients were in quarantine in his hospital.

 Li sent a chat group message to fellow doctors warning them about seven patients who had been quarantined in a Wuhan hospital with a mysterious illness that resembled SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome).

Within hours, the message went viral on social media, and Li was summoned to the Public Security Bureau, the BBC News reported.

"When I saw [the message] circulating online, I realized that it was out of my control and I would probably be punished," Li told CNN from his hospital bed in Wuhan.

The police demanded Li sign a document denying his claims about a new virus. Meanwhile, thousands of people contracted the illness and hundreds died before Chinese officials announced the epidemic on Jan. 8.

The Chinese government is accused of suppressing the true scale of the epidemic. The death toll has doubled in just 24 hours to 630 with over 28,000 infections worldwide. But critics say the true numbers are probably much higher.

There are 12 confirmed coronavirus cases so far in the United States.