Chinese government statistics reveal more than 150,000 people disappeared from Hubei province’s government benefit list – a change that comes amidst the country’s falsified reporting on its COVID-19 death toll.

“Disturbing Chinese government statistics reveal a huge drop in the number of old people receiving state payments in Hubei – the province containing the city of Wuhan – in the immediate aftermath of the pandemic’s eruption,” the Daily Mail summarizes.

The Hubei government’s official website discloses that “the number of elderly enjoying the old age allowance” fell from 1,149,153 in the final quarter of 2019 to 997,332 in the first three months of 2020 – a decline of 151,821.

The official data shows a fall of over 150,000 people receiving the benefits in the first quarter of 2020, appearing to corroborate critics insisting the Chinese Communist Party was providing fake statistics related to COVID-19.

According to the party, there have been just 4,636 Covid deaths in the country of 1.4 billion – with all except 124 of the fatalities in the central province of Hubei.

“In the days after Wuhan’s lockdown, the CIA warned that China was hiding the real number of infections and deaths, while several studies suggested fatality levels were at least ten times higher than being admitted,” the Daily Mail adds.