The dreaded Coronavirus otherwise known as COVID-19 has now become a global disease domiciling practical in all the nations of the world.
The virus, which emanated from China, and which has recorded a total of 78,630 cases, including 2,747 deaths is confirmed to be domiciled in about 50 nations including Nigeria, which recorded her first victim, an Italian.
According to World Health Organisations, WHO, other countries have over 3,474 cases and 54 deaths and it is still counting.
WHO’s Director-General, noted that as at February 28, 2020, “The number of new cases reported in the rest of the world has exceeded the number of new cases in China. And in the past 24 hours, seven countries have reported cases for the first time: Brazil, Georgia, Greece, North Macedonia, Norway, Pakistan and Romania. The epidemics in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Italy and the Republic of Korea demonstrate what this virus is capable of. But this virus is not influenza. With the right measures, it can be contained. The evidence we have is that there does not appear to be widespread community transmission.
Continuing, “In Guangdong, scientists tested more than 320,000 samples from the community and only 0.14 per cent were positive for COVID-19. That suggests that containment is possible. Indeed, there are many countries that have done exactly that. There are several countries that have not reported a case for more than two weeks: Belgium, Cambodia, India, Nepal, Philippines, the Russian Federation, Sri Lanka and Viet Nam. Each of these countries is different. And each shows that aggressive, early measures can prevent transmission before the virus gets a foothold. Of course, that doesn’t mean those countries won’t have more cases. In fact, as of Tuesday, both Finland and Sweden had reported no cases for more than two weeks, but unfortunately both had new cases yesterday. That’s why we advocate a comprehensive approach. Every country must be ready for its first case, its first cluster, the first evidence of community transmission and for dealing with sustained community transmission. And it must be preparing for all of those scenarios at the same time”.
He emphasised, “No country should assume it won’t get cases. That could be a fatal mistake, quite literally. This virus does not respect borders. It does not distinguish between races or ethnicities. It has no regard for a country’s GDP or level of development. The point is not only to prevent cases arriving on your shores. The point is what you do when you have cases. But we are not hopeless. We are not defenseless. There are things every country and every person can do. Every country needs to be ready to detect cases early, to isolate patients, trace contacts, provide quality clinical care, prevent hospital outbreaks, and prevent community transmission”.
