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HEALTH-VIRUS-WHO
Coronavirus cases emerging faster outside China: WHO
GENEVA, Feb 26, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – There are now more new cases of the
coronavirus reported each day outside China than inside the hardest-hit
country, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.
“Yesterday, the number of new cases reported outside China exceeded the
number of new cases in China for the first time,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus told diplomats in Geneva, according to a written version of his
speech.
The UN health agency put the number of new cases in China at 411 on
Tuesday and those registered outside the country stood at 427.
Governments worldwide are scrambling to prevent the spread of the new
coronavirus after a surge of infections in Italy, Iran and South Korea.
Tedros said the “sudden increase of cases” in those countries was “deeply
concerning”, adding that a WHO team would travel to Iran this weekend to
evaluate the situation.
While new case numbers and deaths are dwindling at the disease epicentre
in China, the country remains by far the hardest hit.
Tedros said that as of Wednesday morning, 78,190 cases of COVID-19 had
been registered in China, including 2,718 deaths.
That compares with 2,790 cases and 44 deaths reported across 37 other
countries.
But WHO has said the epidemic in China peaked and on February 2 and has
been declining since.
Bruce Aylward, who headed a WHO-backed expert mission to China, hailed the
drastic quarantine and containment measures taken by Beijing, saying the
country had “changed the course” of the outbreak.
But he told reporters in Geneva that other nations were “simply not
ready”.
In Wednesday’s speech, Tedros acknowledged that the hike in cases outside
China had prompted a push for a pandemic to be declared.
“We should not be too eager to declare a pandemic,” he said, stressing
that such a declaration could “signal that we can no longer contain the
virus, which is not true.”
“We are in a fight that can be won if we do the right things.”
But he insisted that WHO would not hesitate to declare a pandemic “if it
is an accurate description of the situation.”
“I am not downplaying the seriousness of the situation, or the potential
for this to become a pandemic, because it has that potential,” he said.
“All countries, whether they have cases or not, must prepare for a
potential pandemic.”
BSS/AFP/BZC/1900HRS