Former Sudburian locked down in Wuhan, China

A Canadian teacher, originally from Sudbury, is living in a Chinese city that's locked down because it's at the heart of the outbreak of a new strain of the coronavirus.

Terry Collinge teaches English to Grade 3 students in Wuhan. He's lived in China since 2008.

When he first heard about the lockdown he thought it was a joke. 

But he's taken steps to deal with the situation by stocking up on food and hand sanitizers. 

"When I go out, I bundle up. I wear a face mask. But I find that the people here are handling it quite well," he said. 

Collinge added that his friends have created some memes and posted them in a group chat. "Everyone's having a good laugh at that."

Collinge described Wuhan as a ghost town. "You know people live there, but you don't see them. It's very quiet, very eerie to an extent. Everyone's at home with their families." 

He has his PlayStation 4 and plenty of books to keep himself occupied.

"No one wants to get sick with this respiratory illness. I'm worried but I try to keep myself busy," he said.

Collinge said he felt the government was doing a good job of moving quickly to try to prevent the spread of the disease. 

He added that the government puts out new information every few hours to keep the public informed and those updates let him tell his friends that he's okay.