The novel coronavirus has spread to pandemic levels, the World Health Organization said as the countries scrambled to deal with the outbreak, which has also collapsed stock markets.
The Geneva based UN body defines pandemic as a disease that has become widespread around the world.
Outside of China, the epicenter of the novel virus, the outbreak has affected several countries including Italy, where more than 600 deaths have resulted from infections and virtually the entire country is in a state of lock down.
In the United States, President Trump has called an emergency meeting Thursday to review his administration’s effort to deal with coronavirus. Washington state has been the most affected while New York has also isolated a cluster with reportedly more widespread infections.
“We are deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity and by the alarming levels of inaction. We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic,” WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a news conference in Geneva.
The global health agency declared a public health emergency of international concern, its “highest level of alarm”, on Jan. 30 when there were fewer than 100 cases of COVID-19 outside China and eight cases of human-to-human transmission of the disease.
As of Thursday, there are more than 118,000 cases in 114 countries and 4,291 people have died, Tedros said, with the numbers expected to climb.
The WHO no longer has a category for declaring a pandemic, except for influenza.
