WHO launches campaign aimed at stopping novel coronavirus misinformation
GENEVA, Switzerland — The World Health Organization said Monday it was working around the clock with internet and social media giants to combat widespread misinformation surrounding the deadly novel coronavirus outbreak.
WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned of the dangers posed by "the spread of rumors and misinformation" as China saw a surge in deaths and infections from the highly contagious virus.
"We have worked with Google to make sure people searching for information about coronavirus see WHO information at the top of their search results," Tedros said in opening remarks to the UN health agency's Executive Board meeting in Geneva.
"Social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook, Tencent and Tiktok have also taken steps to limit the spread of misinformation," he said.
His comments were interrupted by a fit of coughing, but the WHO chief assured the assembly that there was no need to worry: "It is not corona."
He spoke as the death toll in China surged above 360, surpassing the number of fatalities in the country from the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak of 2002-03.
The number of infections in China also jumped significantly on Monday, passing 17,200.
The 57 confirmed new deaths on Monday was the single-biggest increase since the virus was detected late last year in the central city of Wuhan, where it is believed to have jumped from animals at a market into humans.
The virus has since spread to more than 24 countries, despite many governments imposing unprecedented travel bans on people coming from China. The first foreign death from the virus was reported in the Philippines on Sunday.
'Infodemic'
WHO warned late Sunday that the 2019-nCoV outbreak "has been accompanied by a massive 'infodemic'," which it defined as "an over-abundance of information — some accurate and some not — that makes it hard for people to find trustworthy sources and reliable guidance when they need it."
The agency said it had risk communication and social media teams "working 24 hours a day to identify the most prevalent rumours that can potentially harm the public's health, such as false prevention measures and cures".
The WHO last week declared the crisis a so-called Public Health Emergency of International Concern, with Tedros reiterating Monday that the rare declaration was not taken due to lack of confidence in China's handling of the situation.
It was "taken primarily because of the signs of human-to-human transmission outside China, and our concern of what might happen if the virus were to spread in a country with a weaker health system," he said.
WHO has also advised against "measures that unnecessarily interfere with international travel and trade", at a time when a wide range of countries are advising against travel to China and even closing their borders to people travelling from the country.
Follow this page for updates on a mysterious pneumonia outbreak that has struck dozens of people in China.
New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins says on Sunday that he had contracted COVID-19, testing positive at a key point in his flailing campaign for re-election.
Hipkins saYS on his official social media feed that he would need to isolate for up to five days -- less than two weeks before his country's general election.
The leader of the centre-left Labour Party said he started to experience cold symptoms on Saturday and had cancelled most of his weekend engagements. — AFP
The World Health Organization and US health authorities say Friday they are closely monitoring a new variant of COVID-19, although the potential impact of BA.2.86 is currently unknown.
The WHO classified the new variant as one under surveillance "due to the large number (more than 30) of spike gene mutations it carries", it wrote in a bulletin about the pandemic late Thursday.
So far, the variant has only been detected in Israel, Denmark and the United States. — AFP
The World Health Organization says on Friday that the number of new COVID-19 cases reported worldwide rose by 80% in the last month, days after designating a new "variant of interest".
The WHO declared in May that Covid is no longer a global health emergency, but has warned that the virus will continue to circulate and mutate, causing occasional spikes in infections, hospitalisations and deaths.
In its weekly update, the UN agency said that nations reported nearly 1.5 million new cases from July 10 to August 6, an 80% increase compared to the previous 28 days. — AFP
The head of US intelligence says that there was no evidence that the COVID-19 virus was created in the Chinese government's Wuhan research lab.
In a declassified report, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) says they had no information backing recent claims that three scientists at the lab were some of the very first infected with COVID-19 and may have created the virus themselves.
Drawing on intelligence collected by various member agencies of the US intelligence community (IC), the ODNI report says some scientists at the Wuhan lab had done genetic engineering of coronaviruses similar to COVID-19. — AFP
Boris Johnson deliberately misled MPs over Covid lockdown-breaking parties in Downing Street when he was prime minister, a UK parliament committee ruled on Thursday.
The cross-party Privileges Committee said Johnson, 58, would have been suspended as an MP for 90 days for "repeated contempts (of parliament) and for seeking to undermine the parliamentary process".
But he avoided any formal sanction by his peers in the House of Commons by resigning as an MP last week.
In his resignation statement last Friday, Johnson pre-empted publication of the committee's conclusions, claiming a political stitch-up, even though the body has a majority from his own party.
He was unrepentant again on Thursday, accusing the committee of being "anti-democratic... to bring about what is intended to be the final knife-thrust in a protracted political assassination".
Calling it "beneath contempt", he said it was "for the people of this to decide who sits in parliament, not Harriet Harman", the veteran opposition Labour MP who chaired the seven-person committee. — AFP
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