WHO Director-General's opening remarks at the media briefing on COVID-19 - 27 July 2020
This Thursday marks six months since WHO declared COVID-19 a public health emergency of international concern.
This is the sixth time a global health emergency has been declared under the International Health Regulations, but it is easily the most severe.
Almost 16 million cases have now been reported to WHO, and more than 640,000 deaths.
And the pandemic continues to accelerate.
In the past 6 weeks, the total number of cases has roughly doubled.
When I declared a public health emergency of international concern on the 30th of January – the highest level of alarm under international law – there were less than 100 cases outside of China, and no deaths.
As required under the International Health Regulations, I will reconvene the Emergency Committee later this week to re-evaluate the pandemic and advise me accordingly.
COVID-19 has changed our world. It has brought people, communities and nations together, and driven them apart.
It has shown what humans are capable of – both positively and negatively.
We have learned an enormous amount, and we`re still learning.
But although our world has changed, the fundamental pillars of the response have not: political leadership, and informing, engaging and listening to communities.
And nor have the basic measures needed to suppress transmission and save lives: find, isolate, test and care for cases; and trace and quarantine their contacts.
Keep your distance from others, clean your hands, avoid crowded and enclosed areas, and wear a mask where recommended.
Where these measures are followed, cases go down. Where they`re not, cases go up.
Countries and communities that have followed this advice carefully and consistently have done well, either in preventing large-scale outbreaks – like Cambodia, New Zealand, Rwanda, T
