COVID-19 crisis may get “worse and worse and worse”: WHO Chief

GENEVA: The World Health Organization (WHO), during a virtual briefing on Monday, July 13, warned that the coronavirus pandemic spreading around the globe will deteriorate if countries refuse to follow stringent public health guidelines.

After a daily record of 230,000 new cases of COVID-19 were reported to the WHO on Sunday, July 12, the UN health agency said the pandemic was only going to get worse unless people stuck to the basics of physical distancing, handwashing and wearing masks.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General, WHO, bluntly said that so many nations are going in the wrong direction, the virus is still the number one public enemy, but the government and people’s actions do not reflect this. He added that if governments do not come up with a comprehensive strategy to suppress transmission of the virus, and if populations do not follow basic public health principles, “there is only one way this pandemic is going to go.” It is going to get worse and worse and worse.

According to a Reuters tally, infections rose above 13 million across the world on Monday, climbing by one million in just five days in a pandemic that has killed more than half a million people.