The World Health Organization has expressed concern over the rapid spread of coronavirus, calling COVID-19 a pandemic.
The new coronavirus outbreak has been characterised as a pandemic, the head of the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was alarmed by the spread and severity of the outbreak, along with a lack of action taken to combat it.
Declaring a pandemic has nothing to do with changes to the characteristics of a disease, but is instead associated with concerns over its geographic spread. According to the World Health Organization, a pandemic is declared when a new disease for which people do not have immunity spreads around the world beyond expectations.
