As the number of Coronavirus cases surges, the World Health Organization (WHO) finally declares Coronavirus (COVID-19) a pandemic this Wednesday (March 11).

The viral disease has swept into at least 114 countries with over 118,000 cases, killing more than 4,000 people globally.

“We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic,” said the WHO chief Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at a media briefing in Geneva.

“Describing the situation as a pandemic does not change WHO’s assessment of the threat posed by this coronavirus. It doesn’t change what WHO is doing, and it doesn’t change what countries should do,” Tedros said, adding that this is the first pandemic caused by the Coronavirus.

WHAT IS A PANDEMIC?

“Pandemic” is a term used when a new disease, which most people have no immunity, spreads in multiple countries and territories around the world at the same time and affects a large group of people.

WHO defines the term as “an outbreak of a new pathogen that spreads easily from person to person across the globe”.

The organization has repeatedly refrained to call the Coronavirus outbreak a pandemic before. “Pandemic is not a word to use lightly or carelessly. It is a word that, if misused, can cause unreasonable fear, or unjustified acceptance that the fight is over, leading to unnecessary suffering and death,” Tedros said.

However, as there is a deep concern over “alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming level of inaction”, it is using the term now.

While the outbreak in China seems to have slowed down by now, the number of COVID-19 cases outside of the country has increased, “and the number of affected countries has tripled,” added the WHO Director-General.

“I remind all countries that we are calling on you to activate and scale up your emergency response mechanisms.

“Let’s all look out for each other,” he said.