Coronavirus crisis may worsen “worse and worse and worse,” warns WHO

GENEVA / ZURICH (Reuters) – The new worldwide coronavirus pandemic will worsen if countries fail to comply with strict health precautions, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned Monday.

“Let me be frank, many countries are heading in the wrong direction, the virus remains the number one public enemy,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a virtual meeting from the headquarters of the UN agency. in Geneva.

“If basic principles are not followed, the only way this pandemic will unfold will be worse and worse.”

Global infections total 13 million, according to a Reuters count, with more than half a million deaths.

Tedros, whose leadership has been widely criticized by United States President Donald Trump, said that of 230,000 new cases on Sunday, 80% were from 10 nations and 50% from just two countries.

The United States and Brazil are the most affected countries.

“There will be no return to normal in the foreseeable future … There is much to worry about,” added Tedros, in some of his strongest comments in recent weeks.

Tedros said the WHO had not yet received a formal notification of Trump’s announced withdrawal from the United States. The President of the United States says the WHO pleased China, where the disease COVID-19 was first detected, at the start of the crisis.

Trump, who first wore a protective mask in public over the weekend, was accused by political opponents of not taking the coronavirus seriously enough, something he denies.

An advanced WHO team went to China to investigate the origins of the new coronavirus, first discovered in Wuhan City. Team members are quarantined, according to standard procedure, before starting work with Chinese scientists, WHO chief emergency officer Mike Ryan said.