Croatia's EU presidency has activated a special EU council crisis mechanism over the coronavirus outbreak in China, the Wednesday edition of Vecernji List daily reported.

The so-called Integrated Political Crisis Response (ICPR) supports “rapid and coordinated decision-making at EU political level” for major and complex crises, including acts of terrorism and health crises, state agency Hina reported.

The council presidency uses the mechanism to streamline information sharing, facilitate collaboration, and coordinate crisis response at the political level. Its tools include a web platform, round the clock contact points and reporting.

Croatia’s embassy in China, as it represents the country chairing the Council of the EU, has been put in charge of local consular coordination in crisis situations.

It will work in cooperation with the EU Delegation in China, coordinate and arrange meetings, encourage information exchange and preparation of joint responses, and seek information from Chinese authorities, Vecernji explained.

Despite a large number of victims, the death rate attributed to the coronavirus outbreak in China is still far lower from those caused by Sars, a disease which had a global outbreak in 2002-03 also caused by a coronavirus.

Estimates say that this new strain, named by scientists 2019-nCoV, leads to the death of around 3 percent of all those infected, while the Sars death rate was 14-15 percent.