Foreign Affairs Minister says eight Canadians in Wuhan have asked for help

Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne says eight Canadians in Wuhan have asked his government for help.

He says Canada knows of 167 citizens in the region of China that's at the epicentre of an outbreak of a new respiratory virus.

China has sharply restricted travel in and out of the province of about 60 million people in an effort to keep the illness from spreading.

Although the virus is new and scientists are still working on understanding it, most cases seem to be mild.

Some of Canada's allies have evacuated diplomatic offices in Wuhan, the city where the coronavirus was first detected, and are taking some of their citizens along on the flights they've chartered.

Canada doesn't have a consulate in Wuhan and isn't offering anything similar.

Champagne says assistance is available to Canadians there on a

case-by-case basis, and all the people who have asked for help are

getting it.