Seven new countries /territories/areas including four African countries (Djibouti, Gambia, Zambia, Mauritius) have reported cases of coronavirus (COVID-19), the World Health Organization (WHO) said today.
Out of the new additional countries four are in Africa, while two in Region of the Americas, one in Eastern Mediterranean Region and one in European Region. The newly infected countries are Djibouti, Gambia, Zambia, Mauritius, Kyrgyzstan, Barbados and Montserrat. In Africa so far 367 cases of COVID-19 is reported of which 7 are dead by the virus.
The number of confirmed cases worldwide has exceeded 200 000. It took over three months to reach the first 100 000 confirmed cases, and only 12 days to reach the next 100 000, according to WHO. Globally a total of 209,127 people are infected by COVID-19 of which 8,778 are dead by the virus. Out of the reported deaths Italy, which lost over 3,300 lives has become the top country losing more lives than China – from where the virus is reported to originate.
It stated that a new protocol to investigate the extent of COVID-19 infection in the population, as determined by positive antibody tests in the general population has been developed.
“To date, 13 countries across five of the six WHO regions, including both high-income and low-and middle-income countries, have begun to implement at least one of the early investigation protocols. A further 18 countries have signaled their intention to implement one of the protocols. WHO will continue to support countries in their epidemiological investigations through the provision of clear and comprehensive protocols.,” WHO said in its daily statement on COVID-19.
On Thursday United Sates President Donald Trump and U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Stephen Hahn indicated that the government is assessing the use of existing drugs such as, chloroquine, which is being used for treatment of Malaria, to be tested for treating COVID-19 virus infected patients.