Some people could not wait to leave the town. Others just wanted to get outside and feel free again. All of them wore face masks against the virus that had forced them to stay in their homes for more than two months. (AP)
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Chinese authorities ended the lockdown of Wuhan on April 8, allowing people to move about and leave the city for the first time in 76 days. (AP)
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The outbreak started in Wuhan, an industrial city of 11 million people on the Yangtze River. (AP)
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Thousands boarded trains, planes and long-distance buses, finally able to return to their homes and jobs.(AP)
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Many had come to visit relatives during the Lunar New Year holiday in late January and were trapped when the coronavirus lockdown was announced with no advance warning. (AP)
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Authorities cut off and shut down the city in a desperate bid to stop the disease from spreading. It still killed more than 2,500 people in Wuhan, by far the highest death toll in China, and grew into a pandemic. (AP)
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A woman wearing a face mask to protect against the spread of coronavirus puts a poncho on a child at Wuhan Tianhe International Airport in Wuhan in central China's Hubei Province, April 8, 2020. (AP)
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A medical worker from China's Jilin Province reacts as she prepares to return home at Wuhan Tianhe International Airport in Wuhan in central China's Hubei Province, April 8, 2020 (AP)
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Workers assemble cars at the Dongfeng Honda Automobile Co., Ltd factory in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province, April 8, 2020. (AP)
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11 million people were clogged with traffic and long lines formed at the airport, train and bus stations as thousands streamed out of the city to return to homes and jobs elsewhere. Yellow barriers that had blocked off some streets were gone, although the gates to residential compounds remained guarded. (AP)
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Residents walk along the Yangtze River on a ferry in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province, April 8, 2020. (AP)
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A walks past a delivery man outside a gold jewelry shop on the streets of Wuhan in central China's Hubei province, April 8, 2020. (AP)
