COVID-19 pandemic could have been prevented, report shows

A high-level independent report, commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO), said WHO should have declared the new coronavirus outbreak in China an international emergency earlier than Jan. 30, 2020, but the next month was “lost” as countries failed to take strong measures to halt the spread. “This is an ongoing disaster that we believe could have been prevented,” Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, co-chair of the panel, stated.

• ‘The lost month of February’: COVID-19 was preventable, report shows