BEIJING — China had shipped a total of 726,700 protective suits among other medical supplies to Hubei as of Feb 12 to help the hardest-hit province fight the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak, according to an official with the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).

"We are working to put key factories back into production and boost their productivity to meet the demands of epidemic prevention and control in Hubei and Wuhan," Cao Xuejun, a senior official with the MIIT, the leading ministry to guarantee medical supplies in the fight against the novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak, told a news conference on Feb 13.

Other medical supplies that had been delivered to Hubei as of Feb 12 include 358,400 medical masks and protective goggles, 156 negative pressure ambulances, 2,286 respirators, 6,929 electrocardiograph monitors and 761 automatic infrared thermometers, she said, pledging further support of medical equipment to the virus epicenter.