Jubilee Post News & Views
Special Desk
Everyday some statement rocks our mind about the COVID-19 and here is yet another one from the World Health Organization (WHO) that says the coronavirus pandemic will be over in two years.
Speaking in Geneva WHO head, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus compared and said the Spanish flu of 1918 took two years to overcome. But he added that current advances in technology could enable the world to halt the virus in less time.
“Of course with more connectiveness, the virus has a better chance of spreading,” he cautioned. “But at the same time, we have also the technology to stop it, and the knowledge to stop it,” he noted, stressing the importance of “national unity, global solidarity”.
The deadly flu of 1918 killed at least 50 million people. The coronavirus has so far killed almost 800,000 people and infected 22.7 million more. Tedros also responded to a question about corruption relating to personal protective equipment (PPE) during the pandemic, which he described as “criminal and a murder”.
Although the question related to allegations of corruption in South Africa, a number of countries have faced similar issues. Protests were held in the Kenyan capital Nairobi over alleged graft during the pandemic, while doctors from a number of the city’s public hospitals went on strike over unpaid wages and a lack of protective equipment.
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The same day, the head of the WHO’s health emergencies programme warned that the scale of the coronavirus outbreak in Mexico was “clearly under-recognised”.
Dr Mike Ryan said the equivalent of around three people per 100,000 were being tested in Mexico, compared to about 150 per 100,000 people in the US.
Mexico has the third highest number of deaths in the world, with almost 60,000 fatalities recorded since the pandemic began, according to Johns Hopkins University.
