On Wednesday, the World Health Organization in its latest press briefing direct from the WHO Headquarters, Geneva, Switzerland on the coronavirus pandemic, which has infected 26,39,243 people worldwide and killed at least 1,83,559 cautioned the world that the fight against the virus wasn’t going to end any time soon.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General, WHO said, “Make no mistake: we have a long way to go. This virus will be with us for a long time and can easily ignite,”
He further added that most countries were still in the early stages of dealing with the new coronavirus pandemic, while the global case count crossed 2.5 million, making most people on the planet susceptible to Covid-19.
Earlier this week, WHO officials said partisan politics and lack of global solidarity are helping to fuel the coronavirus pandemic, urging countries to work together as Covid-19 continues to spread throughout the world.
“The cracks between people and the cracks between parties is fueling it. Don’t use this virus as an opportunity to fight against each other or score political points. It’s dangerous. It’s like playing with fire.”, said Mr.Tedros on Monday.
Tedros’ comment came six days after President Donald Trump announced that the U.S. will suspend funding to WHO while it reviews the agency’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Trump criticized the international agency’s response to the outbreak, saying “one of the most dangerous and costly decisions from the WHO was its disastrous decision to oppose travel restrictions”.
“We declared the international emergency at the right time when there were only 82 cases outside of China and no deaths and the rest of the world had enough time to respond,” said WHO Director- General.
He further informed that the epidemic in Europe appeared to be stable or declining, although numbers were low. An upward trend in Africa, Central and South America and Central Europe could be seen as a cause of worry.
Tedros sounded a word of caution by saying that there are still many gaps in the world’s defences against the virus and that no single country has everything in place.