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Jodi Xu Klein

The World Health Organisation warned Tuesday that the opportunity to limit the international spread of the coronavirus outbreak is fading, and that if the disease isn’t contained it could wreak global havoc.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general at the World Health Organisation (WHO), said that the virus “is more powerful in bringing serious consequences than any terrorist attack [can accomplish]”.
“It’s not just the health issue, it’s a matter of economic, political and social upheavals.”
“I remind and will continue to remind the world to take [the outbreak] really seriously. We are asking countries to be as aggressive as possible,” said Tedros. “Time is of the essence.”


During the briefing on Tuesday in Geneva, Switzerland, WHO officially dubbed the virus Covid-19 – for coronavirus disease of 2019 – in an effort to create a common title that did not refer to a geographic location or a specific animal.
“Having a name prevents other names that could be used for stigmatisation,” Tedros said.
The WHO’s warnings came after the coronavirus claimed its highest number of lives within a 24-hour period, with China reporting 108 deaths on Monday.
Questions on China’s coronavirus response can wait, ex-WHO official says
Since the disease emerged in late December, more than 42,000 confirmed cases and over 1,000 deaths have been reported in China. Outside China, there have been 476 confirmed cases and two deaths.
The deadly virus, which originated in Wuhan, the capital of China’s Hubei province, has led numerous countries to close borders and suspend travel with China in fears of the infection.
The Trump administration announced on January 31 a ban on any non-US citizen who had recently visited China from entering the US.


Major airlines around the world have suspended routes to China, Hong Kong and Macau. Last week, Royal Caribbean Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Line said they would temporarily bar any passengers holding passports from China, Hong Kong and Macau from boarding their cruise ships, regardless of when they had last been in China. (Both cruise lines revised that position on Monday, saying they would bar any passengers, regardless of nationality, from boarding their ships if they have been in China in the last 15 days.)
Tedros also stressed that the WHO, the United Nations’ health agency, was continuing with its containment strategy toward the virus.
He praised China’s government for locking down Wuhan, a city of 11 million that is a transit hub in central China, to reduce migration from there to other parts of the country and the world.
Coronavirus named Covid-19 as hopes rise that cases could peak soon
In doing so, he said, Beijing had created a “window of opportunity” for the world to limit the spread of the outbreak.
But, Tedros urged, “let’s be serious about using the window” because “I don’t think the window will stay long”.
He did not offer an estimate of what he imagined the time frame to be.


Tedros’s cries of alarm come after the WHO first declined to declare Covid-19 a global public health emergency in mid-January, only to reverse itself on January 30, citing the contagion’s potential to spread to countries not prepared to deal with it.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, the WHO is hosting a forum of 400 scientists globally, both in person and online, to discuss how to work better together to combat the disease. The latest development is that the first vaccine could be ready in 18 months, Tedros said.
Michael Ryan, the WHO’s head of emergency programmes, said on Tuesday that Covid-19 had the potential to spread faster than either the Ebola or Sars viruses. Earlier this week, Covid-19 exceeded the Sars outbreak of 2002-03 in terms of deaths attributed to it.
“We have the unknowns about the ways of transmission and about the mild cases,” Ryan said.
Seven more coronavirus cases confirmed in Hong Kong, raising city’s total to 49
The latest report by the US Centres of Disease Control and Prevention said that still “much is unknown about how [the virus] spreads”.
Transmission methods have been shown to include human-to-human contact. The incubation period is believed to be up to 14 days.


In recent days, epidemiologists have said that the contagion may also spread through “aerosol transmission” – when tiny particles or droplets of the virus suspended in the air are inhaled.
Others indicated that transmissions are possible from patients who show mild or no symptoms.
WHO officials said that the agency had also activated a UN crisis management team to better assess and mitigate the outbreak’s economic implications.
In the long term, the WHO needs to focus on prevention, the officials said. Last week, the agency issued a call for US$675 million to support preparedness and response operations around the world from February through April 2020.
“The world is getting smaller and smaller. Whatever happens in the weakest link [of the world’s health care system] will affect all of us,” said Tedros.
“If the world doesn’t want to wake up to fight this as our No 1 enemy, I don’t think we will learn the lesson,” he added. “Time is ticking.”

 

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Coronavirus pandemic

Coronavirus: WHO head warns ‘time is of the essence’ in limiting disease’s global spread

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director general of the World Health Organisation, at Tuesday’s news briefing in Geneva, Switzerland, on the coronavirus outbreak. Photo: Reuters

Coronavirus tests China’s ambitions as a global health leader

Medical staff unload supplies at Wuhan, where the coronavirus originated. Photo: EPA-EFE

epa08179988 Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), talks to the media after the WHO's Emergency Committee meeting on the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), during a press conference, at the World Health Organization (WHO) headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, 30 January 2020. The WHO has declared an global public health emergency over the outbreak of the Coronavirus. EPA-EFE/JEAN-CHRISTOPHE BOTT

WHO chief calls for caution on coronavirus trade and travel bans as China lashes out at US

Personnel in protective clothing approach an aircraft, chartered by the US State Department to evacuate government employees and other Americans from the coronavirus threat in Wuhan, after it arrived at March Air Reserve Base in Riverside County, California, on Friday. Photo: Reuters

Coronavirus: hundreds of Taiwan travellers stranded in Philippines due to ban on Chinese tourists

Passengers arrive at Manila’s international airport in the Philippines. Photo: AP

A thermal scanner checks on arriving passengers at Manila's international airport, Philippines, Thursday, Jan. 23, 2020. The government is closely monitoring arrival of passengers as a new coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, China has infected hundreds and caused deaths in that area. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)

epa08149567 Passengers wearing face masks who arrived from Guangzhou, China lineup for immigration at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport in Manila, Philippines, 22 January 2020. According to media reports, at least nine people have died and more than 400 people are confirmed infected by a new respiratory virus which was first detected in Wuhan, China. The virus, called the coronavirus, can be passed between humans and has spread to the USA, Thailand, South Korea, Japan and Taiwan. EPA-EFE/MARK R. CRISTINO

Passengers stranded at an airport in Manila. Photo: Chueh Yu-hsuan

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World Health Organisation also gives the disease a name: Covid-19, for coronavirus disease of 2019
The virus ‘is more powerful in bringing serious consequences than any terrorist attack’, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says



World Health Organisation also gives the disease a name: Covid-19, for coronavirus disease of 2019.


Coronavirus: WHO head warns ‘time is of the essence’ in limiting disease’s global spread

World Health Organisation also gives the disease a name: Covid-19, for coronavirus disease of 2019 The virus ‘is more powerful in bringing serious consequences than any terrorist attack’, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says

World Health Organisation also gives the disease a name: Covid-19, for coronavirus disease of 2019

The virus ‘is more powerful in bringing serious consequences than any terrorist attack’, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says