Coronavirus: WHO chief warns world the ‘worst has yet to come’

The comments raised new alarm bells about the pandemic as many countries begin to ease restrictive measures

Employees of Electrocomponentes de Mexico are seen during a protest to halt work amid the spread of coronavirus, in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Reuters

US President Donald Trump holds up a list of coronavirus testing locations that he says US states can use as he addresses the daily coronavirus task force briefing at the White House in Washington, US. Reuters

An Indian tribal couple ride on a bicycle through a deserted highway during the nationwide lockdown at Daranggiri village, west of Gauhati, India. AP Photo

A man walks through a field hospital set up inside the Corferias convention center in Bogota, Colombia. AP Photo

Gene Campbell, 89, who contracted coronavirus in early March, sits in his son's car after spending six weeks in the hospital, Washington, US. Reuters

Russian President Vladimir Putin chairs a video conference meeting on the coronavirus situation, at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence outside Moscow. AFP

A woman stands at an access point to a neighborhood closed off by barriers in Wuhan, China's central Hubei province. AFP

People walk past shops on a pedestrian street in Dortmund, western Germany, during the coronavirus pandemic. Some small shops in Germany reopened on Monday as the country took a cautious step toward returning to normal. AFP

Members of "Team Drone Masters" after spraying disinfectant d in Ahmedabad, India. AFP

A passenger wearing a face mask stands next to a poster of Tokyo 2020 Olympic mascot Miraitowa on a train in Tokyo. AFP

Olav Kneppen delivers his 4-year-old son Oliver to the "Espira Grefsen Station Kindergarten" in Oslo. Norway, which says it has coronavirus under control, started opening up pre-schools after a month-long closure. AFP

A man rides his bike in a deserted street of central Athens on a lockdown. AFP

City workers disinfect a bus stop to help prevent the spread of coronavirus outside a closed cinema featuring a mural of film directors, from left, Federico Fellini, Alfred Hitchcock, Luis Buñuel and Lucrecia Martel in Montevideo, Uruguay. AP Photo

The World Health Organisation chief warned reporters on Monday that “the worst is yet ahead of us” in the coronavirus pandemic, reviving the alarm just as many countries ease restrictive measures aimed at reducing its spread.

WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus didn’t specify why he believes the outbreak, which has infected about 2.5 million people and killed more than 166,000, would get worse. But he and others have previously pointed to the spread of the illness through Africa, where health systems are far less developed.

“Trust us. The worst is yet ahead of us,” Tedros told reporters from WHO headquarters in Geneva. “Let’s prevent this tragedy. It’s a virus that many people still don’t understand.”

Some Asian and European governments have gradually eased or started to relax “lockdown” measures such as quarantines, school and business closures and restrictions on public gatherings, citing a decline in the growth of Covid-19 case counts and deaths.

Mr Tedros and his agency have been on the defensive after President Donald Trump of the United States – the WHO’s biggest single donor – last week ordered a halt to US funding for the agency, saying it had botched its early response to the outbreak.

Among other things, Mr Trump insisted the WHO had failed to adequately share information about the virus “in a timely and transparent” way after it erupted in China late last year.

Mr Tedros said: “There is no secret in WHO because keeping things confidential or secret is dangerous. It’s a health issue.”

“This virus is dangerous. It exploits cracks between us when we have differences,” he said.

Mr Tedros said staff from the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention had been seconded to work with his agency, suggesting it was a sign of the WHO’s transparency.

“Having CDC staff [at the WHO] means there is nothing hidden from the US from Day One” Mr Tedros said. “Our CDC colleagues also know that we give information immediately to anyone.”

In one of his starkest comparisons yet, the UN health agency chief also referred to the so-called Spanish flu more than a century ago, saying the coronavirus has a “very dangerous combination … like the 1918 flu that killed up to 100 million people.”

Mr Tedros called the illness “Public Enemy No. 1”.

He said: “We have been warning from day one: This is a devil that everybody should fight.”