Saudi Press

Saudi Arabia and the world
Saturday, Jun 21, 2025

Coronavirus: WHO urges governments to act and not be ‘paralysed by the fear of failure’

Europe is now the epicentre of the pandemic, leader of global health body says. A multipronged approach is urged: testing, contact tracing, quarantine and social distancing. ‘Do it all,’ WHO urges.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Friday that it would resist being dragged into a blame game over which country was responsible for the coronavirus pandemic and urged governments to move swiftly to deal with the situation instead of being “paralysed by the fear of failure”.

As the number of cases being reported daily worldwide now exceeds the peak daily new infections reported by China at the height of its epidemic in February, the head of the UN agency’s health emergencies programme, Michael Ryan, said at a briefing that a major worry was that “everyone is afraid of the consequences of error”.

“The greatest error is not to move,” he said. “The greatest error is to be paralysed by the fear of failure. And I think that’s the single biggest lesson I’ve learned in Ebola responses in the past.”

At the same briefing, WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Europe had become the epicentre of the pandemic.

As of early Friday, some 162,000 infections had been reported in 123 countries and territories, with more than 5,000 fatalities, he said.

While China was the early focal point of the outbreak, infections have drastically slowed there and the disease is now gripping the European continent. Italy is the worst affected country after China, with 1,266 dead and 17,660 confirmed cases since the contagion first surfaced there on February 21.

Spain, the worst-affected European country after Italy, reported a 50 per cent jump in fatalities to 120 on Friday. Infections increased to 4,231.

Attention has shifted from Milan to Madrid, where Spanish Prime Minister Pedros Sanchez warned the number of confirmed cases could jump to 10,000 next week.

“We are only in the first phase of the fight against the virus. Very hard weeks await us,” he said as he announced a state of alarm for the country.

Part of Catalonia has already been locked down, but the main concern lies in Madrid, where all shops except those selling food and necessities are now closed.

At least four countries – Poland, Denmark, Slovakia and the Czech Republic – announced they would completely shut their borders.

Tedros said the WHO’s main message to countries was to continue to employ a multipronged approach to deal with the outbreak.

“You must take a comprehensive approach, not testing alone, not contact tracing alone, not quarantine alone, not social distancing alone. Do it all,” he said.

“Any country that looks at the experience of other countries with large epidemics and thinks ‘that won’t happen to us’ is making a deadly mistake,” he said. “It can happen to any country.”

Tedros said the experience of countries now seeing a slower rate of new infections – China, South Korea and Singapore, among others – “clearly demonstrates that aggressive testing and contact tracing combined with social distancing measured measures and community mobilisation can prevent infections and save lives”.

When Ryan was asked which country was faring well in its coronavirus response, he said: “We are not seeking to identify those who are doing poorly or doing well. We’re trying to identify the best lessons we can all use and the best way to move forward together.

“No one has done perfectly and no one has made all the mistakes. We share all the errors together, so we will share failure in the same way we will share success.”

Ryan’s comments came as the US and China escalated their sparring over who was to blame for the pandemic. In a rare televised address from the Oval Office on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump called the outbreak a “foreign virus”.

Some of his allies, including Republican Senator Rick Scott and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, referred to it as the “Chinese coronavirus” or the “Wuhan virus”.

On the other side of the coin, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian left many baffled as he tweeted on Thursday with claims that it was the US military that brought the virus to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where a bulk of China’s Covid-19 infections and deaths occurred.



In response, the US state department summoned the Chinese ambassador to Washington, Cui Tiankai, on Friday.

A state department spokesman said the assistant secretary of state for the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, David Stilwell, gave a very “stern representation” of the US government’s position on the matter to Cui.

Friday’s briefing at the WHO’s Geneva headquarters was the first held with no journalists present, as part of recommended social distancing measures.

WHO officials did not address Trump’s 30-day travel ban on 26 European countries, which was announced on Wednesday night.
Ryan said while each country must decide on the course of action to take to protect its population, “we’ve also consistently said that blanket travel measures in their own right will do nothing to protect an individual state”.

“In fact, many countries who have outright travel bans early in this response, ended up importing cases anyway, and may have reacted later than they should have because they assumed travel restrictions would protect them,” he said.

Trump, under fire for his administration’s languid response to the outbreak, declared a national emergency on Friday, freeing up money and waiving some regulations to deal with the outbreak.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Saudi Press
0:00
0:00
Close
Israel Confirms Assassination of Quds Force Commander in Tehran
16 Billion Login Credentials Leaked in Unprecedented Cybersecurity Breach
Senate hearing on who was 'really running' Biden White House kicks off
G7 Leaders Fail to Reach Consensus on Key Global Issues
Mass exodus in Tehran as millions try to flee following Trump’s evacuation order
Iranian Military Officers Reportedly Seek Contact with Reza Pahlavi, Signal Intent to Defect
Vietnam Emerges as Luxury Yacht Destination for Ultra‑Rich
China's Iranian Oil Imports Face Disruption Amid Escalating Middle East Tensions
Trump Demands Iran's Unconditional Surrender Amid Escalating Conflict
Israeli Airstrike Targets Iranian State TV in Central Tehran
President Trump is leaving the G7 summit early and has ordered the National Security Council to the Situation Room
Netanyahu Signals Potential Regime Change in Iran
Analysts Warn Iran May Resort to Unconventional Warfare
Iranian Regime Faces Existential Threat Amid Conflict
Energy Infrastructure Becomes War Zone in Middle East
Iran Conducts Ballistic Missile Launches Amid Heightened Tensions with Israel
Iran Signals Openness to Nuclear Negotiations Amid Ongoing Regional Tensions
Shock Within Iran’s Leadership: Khamenei’s Failed Plan to Launch 1,000 Missiles Against Israel
Trump's Anti-War Stance Tested Amid Israel-Iran Conflict
UK Deploys Jets to Middle East Amid Rising Tensions
Exiled Iranian Prince Reza Pahlavi Urges Overthrow of Khamenei Regime
Wreck of $17 Billion San José Galleon Identified Off Colombia After 300 Years
Iran Launches Extensive Missile Attack on Israel Following Israeli Strikes on Nuclear Sites
Israel Issues Ultimatum to Iran Over Potential Retaliation and Nuclear Facilities
Black Box Recovered from Air India Crash Site
Coinbase CEO Warns Bitcoin Could Supplant US Dollar Amid Mounting National Debt
Trump to Iran: Make a Deal — Sign or Die
Operation "Like a Lion": Israel Strikes Iran in Unprecedented Offensive
Israel Launches 'Operation Rising Lion' Targeting Iranian Nuclear and Military Sites
Israeli Forces Intercept Gaza-Bound Aid Vessel Carrying Greta Thunberg
IMF Warns of Severe Global Trade War Impacts on Emerging Markets
Syria to Reconnect to Global Economy After 14 Years of Isolation
Israel Confirms Arming Gaza Clan to Counter Hamas Influence
Global News Roundup: From Ukraine's strategic military strikes and Russia's demands and Tensions Escalate in Ukraine, to serious legal issues faced by Britons in Bali and Trump's media criticism, the latest developments highlight a turbulent landscape
U.S. Reduces Military Presence in Syria
Trump Demands Iran End All Uranium Enrichment in Nuclear Talks
Iran Warns Europe Against Politicizing UN Nuclear Report
Paris Saint-Germain's Greatest Triumph Is Football’s Lowest Point
OPEC+ Agrees to Increase Oil Output for Third Consecutive Month
Turkey Detains Istanbul Officials Amid Anti-Corruption Crackdown
Meta and Anduril Collaborate on AI-Driven Military Augmented Reality Systems
EU Central Bank Pushes to Replace US Dollar with Euro as World’s Main Currency
European and Arab Ministers Convene in Madrid to Address Gaza Conflict
U.S. Health Secretary Ends Select COVID-19 Vaccine Recommendations
Trump Warns Putin Is 'Playing with Fire' Amid Escalating Ukraine Conflict
India and Pakistan Engage Trump-Linked Lobbyists to Influence U.S. Policy
U.S. Halts New Student Visa Interviews Amid Enhanced Security Measures
Trump Administration Cancels $100 Million in Federal Contracts with Harvard
SpaceX Starship Test Flight Ends in Failure, Mars Mission Timeline Uncertain
King Charles Affirms Canadian Sovereignty Amid U.S. Statehood Pressure
×