GENEVA (Reuters) – The World Health Organization is describing the new coronavirus as a pandemic, it said on Wednesday, adding that Italy and Iran were now in the frontline of the disease and other countries would soon join them.
“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 on Wednesday.
He urged the global community to redouble efforts to contain the outbreak, saying aggressive measures could still play a big role to curb the pandemic.
Mike Ryan, head of the WHO’s emergencies program, said the situation in Iran was “very serious” and the agency would like to see more surveillance and more care for the sick.
The coronavirus, which emerged in China in December, has
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