GENEVA: The World Health Organization warns that the COVID-19 pandemic is rapidly spreading with over 300,000 cases recorded yesterday.
The infection that initially took 67 days to reach the first 100,000 cases only took 11 days for the next 100,000 and only four days for the next 100,000 cases.
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, however, said it was not too late for the world to change its trajectory.
Dr. Tedros also urged people to stay home and follow social incarceration measures in an effort to curb the virus.
Tedros urged the world to use rigorous testing and contact tracking strategies.
He said this during a press conference with FIFA President Gianni Infantino in conjunction with the “COVID-19 Overcome” campaign.
Tedros said while giving the analogy of football matches, the ‘defending’ measures taken by the world today would not help to give ‘victory’.
“Asking people to stay at home and other social distancing measures are an important way of slowing down the spread of the virus and buying time, but they are defensive measures,” he said.
“The most important thing is what you do, you can’t win a football game by defending yourself, you have to attack.”
“To win, we have to attack the virus with aggressive and targeted tactics – testing each suspected case, isolating and keeping each case verified and chasing and spanning every encounter,” he said.
Sources: The Mercury News