A newly identified coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, has caused a worldwide pandemic of respiratory illness, called COVID-19. It’s almost a year since the infectious disease caused by a newly discovered coronavirus hit the countries globally. The pandemic had a drastic impact on the economy, and also changed the way humans work, live and led to the discovery of new normal times. As the year 2020 draws to and end, we take you through the timeline of the disease that unfolded since last year.
31 Dec 2019
It was in December last year that Wuhan Municipal Health Commission, China, reported a cluster of cases of pneumonia in Wuhan, Hubei Province. As per WHO, it is the time when a novel coronavirus was identified.
1 January 2020
As soon as we entered 2020, the WHO had set up the IMST (Incident Management Support Team) across the three levels of the organization which had put the organization on an emergency footing for dealing with the outbreak.
4 January 2020
It is when the WHO reported on social media about cluster of pneumonia cases – with no deaths – in Wuhan, Hubei province.
5 January 2020
WHO published the first Disease Outbreak News on the new virus. It contained a risk assessment and advice, and reported on what China had told the organization about the status of patients and the public health response on the cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan.
10 January 2020
WHO issued a comprehensive package of technical guidance online with advice to all countries on how to detect, test and manage potential cases, based on what was known about the virus at the time. This guidance was shared with WHO's regional emergency directors to share with WHO representatives in countries.
Based on experience with SARS and MERS and known modes of transmission of respiratory viruses, infection and prevention control guidance were published to protect health workers recommending droplet and contact precautions when caring for patients, and airborne precautions for aerosol generating procedures conducted by health workers.
12 January 2020
China publicly shared the genetic sequence of COVID-19.
13 January 2020
Officials confirm a case of COVID-19 in Thailand, the first recorded case outside of China.
14 January 2020
The WHO's technical lead informed of a limited human-to-human transmission of the coronavirus (in the 41 confirmed cases), mainly through family members, and that there was a risk of a possible wider outbreak. It has also mentioned that human-to-human transmission would not be surprising given its experience with SARS, MERS and other respiratory pathogens.
20-21 January 2020
It is only during this time WHO experts from its China and Western Pacific regional offices conducted a brief field visit to Wuhan. During this time the 2019 novel coronavirus has killed 4 and infected more than 200 in China, before Zhong Nanshan, MD, finally confirms it can be transmitted from person to person. However, the WHO is still unsure of the necessity of declaring a public health emergency.
22 January 2020
After the visit, WHO found there was evidence of human-to-human transmission in Wuhan but more investigation was needed to understand the full extent of transmission.
30 January 2020
WHO’s situation report for 30 January reported 7818 total confirmed cases worldwide, with the majority of these in China, and 82 cases reported in 18 countries outside China. WHO gave a risk assessment of very high for China, and high at the global level.
11 March 2020
It is much after two months of deliberations and reporting that the organisation deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming levels of inaction, it made the assessment that Covid-19 can be characterized as a pandemic.
13 March 2020
COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund launched to receive donations from private individuals, corporations and institutions.
18 March 2020
WHO and partners launch the Solidarity Trial, an international clinical trial that aims to generate robust data from around the world to find the most effective treatments for COVID-19.
So far the disease has infected more than 67.72 million people globally and killed 1,548,575.