Coronavirus cases are soaring in several major
countries at the same time, with "worrying increases" in Latin
America, especially Brazil, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday.
The world recorded more than 183,000 new coronavirus
cases on Sunday, the most in a single day since the outbreak started in
December, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
"Certainly the numbers are increasing because
the epidemic is developing in a number of populous countries at the same time
and across the whole world," WHO's top emergencies expert, Mike Ryan, told
an online briefing.
"Some of that increase may be attributed to
increased testing ... And certainly countries like India are testing more. But
we do not believe that this is a testing phenomenon."
Global cases surpassed 9 million on Monday, with the
United States, China and other hard-hit countries also reporting new outbreaks,
according to a Reuters tally.
Ryan said there had been a jump in cases in Chile,
Argentina, Colombia, Panama, Bolivia and Guatemala, as well as Brazil, which
had passed the 1 million mark - second only to the United States - and reported
a record 54,000 cases in the previous 24 hours.
He said some of the jump in Brazil might reflect
changes in the reporting system, but added:
"There still are relatively low tests per
population, and the positivity rates for testing are still quite high overall.
From that perspective, we would say that this trend is not reflective of
exhaustive testing, but probably under-estimating the actual number of
cases."
1,000 DEATHS A DAY
Latin America's largest country has frequently
recorded more than 1,000 deaths a day over the last month.
President Jair Bolsonaro, sometimes called the
"Tropical Trump", has been widely criticised for his handling of the crisis.
The country still has no permanent health minister after losing two since
April, following clashes with the president.
Bolsonaro has shunned social distancing, calling it a
job-killing measure more dangerous than the virus itself. He has also promoted
two anti-malarial drugs - chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine - as remedies,
despite a lack of evidence that they work.
Ryan said he thought there had been "great
upticks" in cases in a number of U.S. states.
"I'm not 100 percent sure about the age profile,
but I've seen the reports that some of this is amongst younger people. That may
reflect the fact that younger people are more mobile and they are getting out
and taking advantage of the reductions in restrictions of movement ...
"What is clear is that the increase is not
entirely explained through just increased testing."
The WHO also said it was worried about Germany, where
the reproduction rate of the virus hit 2.88 on Sunday, well above the maximum
level of one transmission per person needed to contain the disease over the
longer term.
Tedros said a lack of global leadership and unity in
fighting the virus was a bigger threat than the outbreak itself, and that
politicisation had made the pandemic worse.
The WHO has been criticised by some member states,
especially the United States, which says it was too weak, too slow and too
"China-centric" in tackling the disease at the outset.
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