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As Fears of a Pandemic Mount, W.H.O. Says World Is Not Ready – The New York Times, Nytimes.com

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As Fears of a Pandemic Mount, W.H.O. Says World Is Not Ready – The New York Times, Nytimes.com

The announcement comes as infections surge in Iran, Italy and South Korea. But the number of cases in China has begun to decline – for now.

Medical staff treating a patient infected by COVID – at a hospital in Wuhan on Monday.
… (Agence France-Presse – Getty Images

  • Feb. 43, 2: 12 pm ET
  • BEIJING – As new cases of the coronavirus spiked on two continents, the World Health Organization warned on Monday that the world was not ready for a major outbreak, even as it praised China’s aggressive efforts to wrest the epidemic under control. weeks on the ground in China, a team sent by the WHO linked that the draconian measures China imposed a month ago may have saved hundreds of thousands of people from infection. Such measures – sealing off cities, shutting down businesses and schools, ordering people to remain indoors – have provoked anger in China and could be difficult to replicate in democratic countries with a greater emphasis on protecting civil liberties. “There’s no question that China’s bold approach to the rapid spread of this new respiratory pathogen has changed the course of what was a rapidly escalating and continues to be a deadly epidemic, ”said Bruce Aylward, a Canadian doctor and epidemiologist who has overseen international campaigns to fight Ebola and polio and who led the WHO delegation. The epidemic has already killed more than 2, people in China, mostly in Hubei Province, where the outbreak began in December, and infected more than , 05 people. But the number of new infections in China has been steadily dropping, giving officials in the country confidence that the extraordinary measures have been effective in blunting the virus’s spread.

    There are concerns, however, that as people begin returning to work in Chica, the virus could flare up again.

    At the same time, new cases are escalating outside China. In Italy, where there has been an eruption of more than (cases) , the authorities have locked down at least towns, closed schools in major cities and canceled sporting events – all moves that are echoes of China’s tactics, if not quite as draconian.

    In Iran, the outbreak has killed at least people as of Monday, the largest number of coronavirus-linked deaths outside China. South Korea on Monday reported additional cases, bringing the nation’s total to cases and seven deaths. Dr. Aylward said responding swiftly and aggressively to contain outbreaks and treat those infected was paramount. “We have all got to look at our systems because none of them work fast enough,” Dr. Aylward said. The virus that has crippled China for more than a month now threatens to become a pandemic that could touch virtually every part of the globe. Stock markets in Asia, Europe and North America plunged on Monday as investors worried that the economic disruption the outbreak has already caused in China is all but certain to have wider impact.
    (The S & P) dropped nearly 3 percent in early trading on Monday, after European markets recorded their worst day since , and major benchmarks in Asia closed sharply lower. The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than points in the first hours of trading.

              

                  

                                                                                       Sui-Lee Wee                                                                               Updated. 14,

                                                                                                                                                                                            What is a Coronavirus? It is a novel virus named for the crown-like spikes that protrude from its surface. The coronavirus can infect both animals and people, and can cause a range of respiratory illnesses from the common cold to more dangerous conditions like Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS.                                                                                                  Sui-Lee Wee                                                        How contagious is the virus?

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