'Late' pandemic call ridiculed

The World Health Organization's embattled leader, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, called on countries to take aggressive action to control the coronavirus last night - 20 hours after he finally declared that Covid-19 is a pandemic.

Tedros said from Geneva: "WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and 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."

The declaration was greeted with an explosion of criticism on social media and late-night television shows in the United States for being weeks too late, while experts said it was hardly surprising as countries and a panicky world have already been acting in a pandemic mode.

Tedros said: "As you know, I said that the global Covid-19 outbreak can now be described as a pandemic. This is not a decision we took lightly."

He said WHO made the assessment firstly because of the speed and scale of transmission.

"Almost 125,000 cases have now been reported to WHO, from 118 countries and territories. In the past two weeks, the number of cases reported outside China has increased almost 13-fold, and the number of affected countries has almost tripled."

Tedros said the second reason was that "despite our frequent warnings, we are deeply concerned that some countries are not approaching this threat with the level of political commitment needed to control it."

He said countries should not give up even though the virus has been declared a pandemic.

"The idea that countries should shift from containment to mitigation is wrong and dangerous. On the contrary, we have to double down," said Tedros, insisting it is a controllable pandemic.

He said countries should use fundamental public health measures in a comprehensive approach, with containment as the central pillar.

The pandemic declaration sparked snide remarks on social media.

"Old news," tweeted bitlord. "If we relied on you for info we'd be f** already."

Another said: "Rest of the world knew this weeks ago."

The Daily Show said: "Great. Now when are you going to declare a #Pandumbic?"

Microbiologist Peter Piot, who discovered the Ebola virus and is a director at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told a Facebook livestream hosted by the Asia Society of Hong Kong Center: "First of all, declaring a pandemic does not make a difference. We all knew it was a pandemic before WHO declared it a pandemic."

He added: "But I hope it will also increase awareness that this is a major global crisis that we are facing."

Piot said travel bans similar to US President Donald Trump's action against the European Union did not make sense.

"Let's not forget, there is transmission within the country and it only tested about 1,500 people until last week, which is far far fewer and insufficient compared to the European Union."

He said Trump's surprising action would not have any beneficiary impact on the spread of Covid-19 in the United States.

maryann.benitez@singtaonewscorp.com