this is now officially a pandemic the
World Health Organization confirmed
today although they declared it was not
too late for countries to act saying
that they were ringing the alarm bell
loud and clear
a hundred and ninety-six people have
died in Italy in one day alone or the
total deaths and the UK is now eight the
Chancellor has promised the NHS whatever
resources it needs to cope along with
other measures to support affected
industries and those in financial
hardship more on those budget measures
in a moment but first here's our health
and social care correspondent Victoria
McDonald's this is what a pandemic
looks like the empty streets of Rome an
entire country and lockdown this is what
a pandemic looks like to hospital staff
and full protection suits patients
breathing with the help of ventilators
overnight the number of people in Italy
diagnosed was covered 19 rows to more
than 12,000 with more than 800 deaths
flying in the face of what seemed
increasingly obvious the World Health
Organization resisted declaring a
covered 19 pandemic for nearly two
months today that changed this is the
first pandemic caused by coronavirus and
we have never before seen a pandemic
that can be controlled at the same time
wh-wha has been in full response mode
since we were notified of the first
cases and we have called every day for
countries to take urgent and aggressive
action we have loud and clear
from the epicenter and Wuhan and China
it has spread and spread and spread
again around the globe this new form of
coronavirus and this is why it is now a
pandemic in the past two weeks the
number of cases outside China has
increased 13 fold the number of affected
countries has tripled more than a
hundred and 18,000 people have been
infected and 4291 lives have been lost
thousands more the w-h-o said a fighting
their lives and hospitals and they
expect to see those numbers climb even
higher whu-oh has been assessing this
outbreak around-the-clock and we're
deeply concerned both by the alarming
levels of spread and severity and by the
alarming levels of inaction pandemic has
declared when an infectious disease
spreads easily from person to person in
many parts of the world without a
question that is what has happened now
the UK response that some countries
where they have perhaps not taken the
threat seriously enough and do not have
in place plan Demick plans or testing
facilities or the capacity to isolate
and treat in intensive care it means
that they need to really consider what
how they can do this and in learn
middle-income countries that can be
quite tricky and particularly because
their health care systems are already
stretched and they will need some
support and assistance and international
funding will be made available to them
more than 90 percent of cases are still
in just four countries China South Korea
Iran and Italy and South Korea they now
believe they are past their peak and
have been applauded for their speedy
response their advice is to focus
efforts on early testing the w-h-o said
that in Iran the situation is still
serious with a high number of deaths and
sick people and they called for global
support for the clinical care of the
infected the UK's or a 22 percent rise
in numbers from yesterday all trust in
England have been told to identify areas
now where they can treat infectious
patients and sources of told Channel 4
News that already some hospitals of
clared wards and preparation and they
are increasing the number of intensive
care beds that can be opened identify
cases isolating them and contact tracing
that remains at the heart
the fight but for how much longer
tonight the w-h-o said urgent and
aggressive action is required by
countries with significant outbreaks
Victoria MacDonald well we're joined up
from Geneva by dr. Margaret Harris from
the World Health Organization thanks for
coming on the program on such a busy day
dr. Harris just tell us very clearly
what by calling it a pandemic would make
or should make the global response to
this any different good evening what
this really means and you're quite right
to talk about us calling it we're
characterizing it as a pandemic what
this really means is we've gone from
what we were saying for weeks we'll just
get ready get ready get your ventilators
ready get your staff ready now we're
saying take this really seriously it's
here it's in your communities but you
still have a chance and this is a the
the unusual thing about this virus you
still have a chance to reverse it if you
take the serious sustained aggressive
action to find every person who could be
infected find all the people who've been
in contact with them work with them help
them understand that it's to their
benefit and more importantly to the
benefit of the people they love that
they do so if I select they do
quarantine to prevent onwards spread and
that we all add three but what you're
also saying quite clearly and actually
alarming is that we haven't got ready
enough and we've had weeks of this now
you know you've been warning about the
effects of this you've been talking
about washing hands and in some cases
self-isolation
we don't seem to have done enough and is
that why we're in this rather sorry
state at the moment it's a very human
characteristic to like think yeah yeah
yeah but it's not me that it's somewhere
else it's somebody else it's somebody
else's problem now it's everybody's
problem and as I was about to say the
answer is in our hands it sounds simple
the hand-washing I'm also talking about
not touching your mouth nose and eyes
and thinking about the ways not to take
hand to mouth lots of different ways and
the other
really
important strategy social distancing so
how can we limit the close physical
contact which is so much the norm we've
never lived more closely than we do now
because we are even though we're spread
out
we're so globalized we're so close we
spend so much time actually in close
physical contact but given that reality
does that not mean that countries where
people are still going to schools and
universities and restaurants and bars
and museums should not be doing any of
that
well every country has an outbreak at a
different stage so the time when you can
really stop it is when you've got a few
cases in your community and that's the
moment when you identify absolutely
everybody around them you stop the
transmission then and you but you also
really mobilize your entire community
you get everyone doing the hand-washing
everyone paying attention to really good
environmental hygiene everyone
understanding that might be a few cases
but stopping this thing is everybody's
business and where we've seen that
happen in places like Singapore they
haven't stopped it completely but they
slowed it enough so they are not seeing
this terrible situation where you've got
hundreds of people in hospital and on
ventilators overloading the health
system given that what you just said
about Singapore should we here in the
United Kingdom be locking down our
cities only if you get to a stage where
you've got a really big sustained
transmission in a particular community
so this is very much case by case now
you've got a big advantage you've got a
fantastic public health system you've
got very very committed people I've
heard about people being mobilized I've
got friends and so on who are on the
list on the roster to come in and help
so you have actually made a lot of
preparations so you have got the
advantage but you still probably do need
to persuade your community that this is
serious the time to do something about
it is absolutely right now ok I keep
pressing you for guidance because you're
there and you know about this stuff
should we shut down
football matches should be shut down you
know the Cheltenham race is taking place
this week with tens of thousands of
people watching horses you know jump and
and gallop certainly mass gatherings are
a problem they are an opportunity for
people to come in close contact
especially if they have to queue or
they're in situation when they have to
use public bathrooms and QR but also
when you organize a mass gathering if
you decide to go ahead you have to do
very intense risk assessment and work
out how to avoid all the incidents all
the opportunities for people to be
jammed together not able to maintain the
hygiene and the social distancing that
does need to be maintained to protect
everyone ok dr. Margaret Harris of the
WTO thank you very much indeed
let's go straight to Washington DC where
we'll find dr. Johnson quick from the
Duke Global Health Institute dr. quick
thanks for coming on the program as well
I mean what the World Health
Organization has basically said is the
China with its extraordinarily draconian
measures bought the world some time and
that we've kind of squandered it do you
agree with that no I think two separate
things are happening I think that the
the China has indeed done a superb job I
think what were but in in the rest of
the world I think there's been a strong
response but not strong enough and the
problem didn't just start in January the
the problem you don't prepare for a
crisis like this in four weeks and
globally we have been under investing in
preparing and we know it clearly six
months ago the Economist Intelligence
units unit Johns Hopkins and nti gave us
our first map of the preparedness of 195
countries we and four out of five aren't
prepared and that's not a surprise so I
think we have to recognize that we
there's been this pet cycle of panic and
neglect okay wait I think the first
corona virus broke out of China right in
2003 there was thousands of pages of
reports lots of promises but we're still
now almost 20 years later not as
prepared as we should be much more
prepared than we were but not as
prepared as we should be okay this may
be the wrong analogy but you've written
you've written a lot about the Spanish
flu of 1918 which killed more than 50
million people worldwide are there any
mistakes that we should have learnt you
know after the 1918 Spanish flu that
we're committing again this time around
well the the key the key lessons that
came out of that is the importance of
leadership at all levels and so I think
early on we didn't have leadership at
the local level in China that lets them
some stumbling happen so that's one and
and that needs to be everywhere messages
from the top that are that are
reassuring there's some basic principles
about be first get the information out
from government sources be credible say
what you know say what you don't know
yet be be empathetic so leadership okay
you get in there a couple of other
lessons right sergeant drugs are you
getting that leadership in the United
States because Donald Trump has been
tweeting all sorts of you know
contradictory things about this virus
are you getting that leadership in a
country that matters to all of us the
u.s. well certainly we we have the
strongest public health system and CDC
and the leadership in in the in the
health community and I think those
messages have been coming down clearly
from from people who are who are
knowledgeable about epidemics and how to
deal with those epidemics
okay just briefly well I'm not for done
sorry do you think that what if you
think of the United States and in the
United Kingdom we should be doing what
the Italians are doing now because if
we're not careful we're going to be like
Italy in two weeks time so here's the
important thing when you have no vaccine
and you have no proven cure you rely on
public trust understanding trust
cooperation if you can it has to be
based on what's appropriate for the up
in that setting if you call the alarm
bell too early in a particular country
and too often when you do people are
going to say it's them calling the alarm
bell so one of the principles is that
each country and in a big country each
state needs to make that risk assessment
based on the realities there and then
move quickly and decisively when it gets
to the point where it more decisive and
more the Chinese would say draconian
action more severe action is needed has
to be based on the local risk assessment
okay dr. Jonathan Creek gotta leave it
there thank you very much indeed for
joining