Islamabad, Feb 6 (IANS): A Chinese national who was admitted to an Islamabad hospital earlier this week over fears that he may be infected by the coronavirus, has tested negative for the fatal disease, according to medical reports.

On Tuesday, the patient was shifted to an isolation ward in the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) hospital from the Islamabad airport. The patient's test samples were sent to the National Institute of Health for confirmation, reports The News International.

The Chinese national will be kept under observation for at least 12 hours.

On Wednesday, NIH officials said that they had received 25 samples of suspected coronavirus cases from Islamabad, Sindh, Pakistan occupied Kashmir and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which all came out as negative.

China's death toll from the new coronavirus increased to 563 on Thursday, surpassing the number of fatalities of its SARS crisis two decades ago.

In South Asia, India has confirmed three positive case, while Sri Lanka and Nepal both reported one case each.