On that day worldwide, outside of China, cases were less than 100 and no one had died.
The Covid-19 pandemic, now in its fourth year and already claiming millions of lives, remains serious enough for the World Health Organization to consider it necessary to maintain the highest alert it declared exactly three years ago on January 30, 2020 .
On that day worldwide, outside of China, cases were less than 100 and no one had died.
Last Friday, based on the official data collected by the WHO – and which the Organization itself considers to be far from reality – cases exceeded 752 million and the dead reached 7 million.
WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus adopted the recommendations of the Covid-19 Emergency Committee of experts who met for the 14th time last week.
From the appearance of the then “mysterious” disease in late 2019 to the explosion of cases in China in early 2023, here are the top dates and developments of the pandemic over the past three years.
“atypical pneumonia”
On December 31, 2019, the World Health Organization is informed that alarming cases of an unknown origin of “atypical pneumonia” have appeared in the city of Wuhan, China.
On January 7, the cause is determined: a new virus of the coronavirus family.
Four days later, Beijing announces the first death. On January 23, Wuhan is quarantined.
Pandemic
The new disease, which will later be named “Covid-19”, is spreading rapidly: by March 6, it passes the mark of 100,000 recorded cases worldwide. On March 11, the WHO officially declared it a “pandemic”.
Europe is being fortified
The first European country to be seriously affected, Italy, imposes a quarantine in the north, which will then be implemented throughout the country. On March 16, the German government calls on the population to “stay at home” and London asks citizens to “avoid social contact.” The next day, France also adopts quarantine measures and soon after the European Union closes its external borders.
Humanity in quarantine
As of early April, more than 3.9 billion people, half the world’s population, are forced or urged to stay indoors and move around as little as possible, according to an AFP tally. The psychological threshold of 1 million cases will soon be exceeded.
Stock markets are falling, entire parts of the global economy are at a standstill, such as transport, tourism… Governments and central banks are announcing the first massive measures to support the economy.
The US and Brazil are in mourning
The pandemic plunges the US and Brazil into mourning in the spring of 2020, as the death toll surpasses that of Europe.
US President Donald Trump reiterates that the virus will eventually disappear naturally. The Brazilian counterpart of Jáich Bolsonaro calls Covid-19 a “flu”. Their management of the pandemic is severely criticized.
Anti-vaccinators and naysayers
In the summer of 2020, many countries are mandating the use of a protective mask in transport, schools, businesses and even on the street. Demonstrations against the mask are being organized.
A year later, objections to vaccination and the presentation of a certificate of illness or vaccination will also cause protests around the world.
Vaccines in record time
Vaccines are being manufactured and tested in record time: the first doses are being administered at the end of 2020 in the US and Europe. Vaccination campaigns, despite their hesitant start, are accelerating in mid-2021 in all Western countries.
But globally, access to vaccines remains uneven: in Africa the vaccination rate remains very low at 24%, compared to the global level of 64%, based on WHO data (autumn 2022).
The origin of the virus is disputed
In January and February 2021, a group of WHO scientists investigates the origin of the new coronavirus in China, without reaching a conclusion. The WHO is asking, without response, for more data from Beijing, which is refusing a new survey in the country.
“All cases remain on the table” repeats, a year and a half later, the Organization. However, studies seem to indicate that the pandemic started in the Wuhan market.
Delta and Omicron, the contagious variants
The highly contagious Delta variant causes an outbreak in April and May 2021 in India, which has the third highest death toll in the world. New outbreaks are also appearing in other countries, such as in Russia.
In late November an even more contagious variant, Omicron, appears in southern Africa and causes panic. It is spreading rapidly in early 2022 but, fortunately, is not accompanied by serious symptoms.
New outbreak of cases in China
Chinese President Xi Jinping’s rigid “zero Covid” policy, accompanied by drastic quarantines, is causing an unprecedented wave of backlash in the country in November.
Beijing decides on December 7 to relax health measures and then lift all restrictions.
An unprecedented wave of cases follows, with hospitals overflowing and medicine running short.
This increase in cases is worrying other countries, many of which are requiring travelers from China to be tested for the new coronavirus in early 2023.
RES-EMP
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