Coronavirus: WHO, experts fail to reach consensus on how deadly outbreak should be defined
- The World Health Organisation said on Friday the risk for Covid-19 to spread globally was very high, but it has stopped short of declaring it a pandemic
- Names aside, experts say the most important thing is establishing a cohesive plan for dealing with the deadly disease
On Friday, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said the risk for Covid-19 to spread globally was very high, but it has stopped short of declaring it a pandemic.
“We have now increased our assessment of the risk of spread and the risk of impact of Covid-19 to very high at global level,” WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a news conference in Geneva on Friday.
But WHO said it was not time to declare a pandemic as it believed containment measures might still be effective.
“If we say there’s a pandemic of coronavirus, we’re essentially accepting that every human on the planet will be exposed to that virus,” Mike Ryan, executive director of the World Health Organisation’s health emergencies program, said in the same press conference.
“The data does not support that as yet and China have clearly shown that that’s not necessarily the natural outcome of this event if we take action, if we move quickly, if we do the things we need to do.”
