(Yicai Global) March 18 -- More epidemic control goods donated by Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding and founder Jack Ma's private charity and destined for virus-stricken Europe arrived in Spain and Italy yesterday.

Some 500,000 surgical masks from the Jack Ma Foundation and the Alibaba Foundation have arrived and will be distributed shortly, the Spanish Ministry of Health tweeted yesterday. Some 50,000 Covid-19 testing kits are on their way, it added.

The Italian Red Cross received a shipment of face masks, testing kits and other epidemic control supplies yesterday. The packages were emblazoned with the words from an aria of the final act of Giacomo Puccini's opera Turandot, "Depart, oh night! Fade away, you stars! At dawn I shall win!"

A food shipment already arrived at Belgium's Liege Airport last week destined for different European countries. Some 1.8 million face masks and 100,000 testing kits will soon follow, Jack Ma said on his Weibo account.

All distribution efforts to Europe are being funneled through Liege Airport where Hangzhou-based Alibaba has, together with the Belgian government, built a world-class smart logistics hub to facilitate the firm's electronic world trade platform for e-commerce vendors. The initiative offers logistics, financing, cloud computing and mobile payment services to offer online sellers more equitable access to cross-border trade opportunities.

Spain and Italy have been particularly hard-hit by the deadly virus. The number of confirmed Covid-19 cases in Spain leapt by 1,987 yesterday to 11,178. To date, 491 people have died of the disease and 1,028 have recovered. Italy, meanwhile, had 31,506 confirmed cases as of yesterday, of which 2,503 had died and 2,941 had recovered.

Apart from Europe, the two foundations are also working with medical institutions in Africa to provide online training materials for the clinical treatment of Covid-19 and epidemic prevention and control methods, Ma said on March 16. They are also donating 100,000 face masks, 1,000 items of protective clothing, 1,000 full-face shields and 20,000 testing kits to each of the continent's 54 countries.

Editor: Kim Taylor