China reported on Saturday that nearly 60,000 people with COVID-19 had died in hospitals since it abandoned its zero-COVID policy last month. It is a huge increase from previously reported figures that follows global criticism of the country's coronavirus data.<br />''<br />''In early December, Beijing abruptly dismantled its strict three-year anti-virus regime of frequent testing, travel curbs and mass lockdowns after widespread protests in late November, and cases have surged since then across the nation of 1.4 billion.<br />''<br />''A health official said on Saturday that COVID fever and emergency hospitalisations had peaked and the number of hospitalised patients was continuing to decline.<br />''<br />''Between the 8th of December and the 12th of January, the number of COVID-related deaths in Chinese hospitals totalled 59,938, Jiao Yahui, head of the Bureau of Medical Administration under the National Health Commission (NHC), told a media briefing. Of those fatalities, 5,503 were caused by respiratory failure due to COVID and the remainder resulted from a combination of COVID and other diseases, she said.<br />''<br />''While international health experts have predicted at least one million COVID-related deaths this year, China had previously reported just over 5,000 deaths since the pandemic began, one of the lowest death rates in the world.<br />