The outbreak of 2019 novel coronavirus reached epidemic status in China by early January, but for several weeks, other nations around the world seemed to be holding cases down to relatively small numbers. Then, even when secondary epicenters of disease emerged in South Korea, Italy, and Iran in the second half of February, the World Health Organizations insisted on calling them “multiple connected international epidemics” rather than use … that other word.
But that’s over. In a Wednesday morning briefing, WHO leaders officially called it: The 2019 novel coronavirus outbreak is a pandemic. And, as WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made clear, that status is well-earned. "In the past two weeks, the number of cases of COVID-19 outside China has increased thirteen-fold and the number of affected countries has tripled,” said Dr. Tedros. “There are now more than 118,000 cases in 114 countries, and 4,291 people have lost their lives."
And, just as Dr. Anthony Fauci stated before the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday, the worst is still to come. "Thousands more are fighting for their lives in hospitals,” said Dr. Tedros. “In the days and weeks ahead, we expect to see the number of COVID-19 cases, the number of deaths, and the number of affected countries climb even higher."
Daily Kos has been using the term “pandemic” in some articles since the end of February, after it became clear that both Italy and Iran had become significant secondary centers that were exporting the disease to dozens of nations. CNN began using the term two days ago, when the number of cases reached 100,000 and community spread had been demonstrated in a number of nations. In general, the term defines the reach of a disease—one that has reached epidemic proportions in several nations—rather than commenting on severity. A disease can be pandemic without being severe, or it can be fatal but not pandemic.
A number of articles have cited claims that the WHO had resisted using the term “pandemic” because it automatically triggers action on the part of some nations that might be actually harmful to early containment of the disease or to local economies. But WHO officials have denied this was part of their reasoning.
In any case, it’s official. This is a pandemic. That doesn’t make it any worse … unfortunately, it also doesn’t make it any better.
