WHO declares the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic
The World Health Organization said COVID-19 could now be characterised as a pandemic as cases surged beyond China and governments scrambled to respond.
The World Health Organization declared the global coronavirus outbreak a pandemic on Wednesday, a stark acknowledgement that COVID-19 was spreading rapidly across continents and that the window to contain it had closed.
Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the agency was "deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming levels of inaction". By then the virus, first identified in the Chinese city of Wuhan late the previous year, had reached more than 100 countries and infected well over 100,000 people, with Italy, Iran and South Korea among the worst-hit outside China.
The word "pandemic" carried no new legal powers, but it was a signal to governments to prepare for widespread transmission. In the days that followed, countries closed borders, shut schools and ordered populations into lockdowns of a kind not seen in peacetime, while stock markets plunged on fears of a deep global recession.
Health systems braced for a surge of patients needing intensive care, and officials urged the public to wash hands, keep their distance and avoid large gatherings. The race to develop tests, treatments and ultimately a vaccine began in earnest.
The declaration marked the moment the crisis became unmistakably global, upending daily life for billions and reshaping the year ahead in ways few could yet imagine.