A patient undergoes blood test at Tongji hospital in Wuhan, Central China's Hubei province. (Photo by Tao Jidong/chinadaily.com.cn)

It's hard to predict when the epidemic will reach its peak, but it may come in a week or 10 days, said Zhong Nanshan, a member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a prominent expert in respiratory diseases. After that, the number of people infected by the novel coronavirus will not increase massively, he told Xinhua News Agency.