Continued: The WHO just declared the coronavirus a pandemic. Here’s what that means.In a press conference Wednesday morning, WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said what has been increasingly obvious for weeks: The novel coronavirus that has swept the world, infecting more than 120,000 people in more than 100 countries, is a pandemic.
“WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and we’re deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity and the alarming levels of inaction. We have therefore made the assessment that Covid-19 can be characterized by “pandemic,” Tedros said, going on to argue that the designation did not mean the situation was hopeless: “All countries can still change the course of this pandemic.”
Mar 11, 2020, 1:01pm EDT
ABC News report here: Coronavirus live updates: World Health Organization declares coronavirus outbreak a 'pandemic'