Shortly before authorities closed off the Chinese city at the epicenter of an outbreak of a new virus, the World Health Organization sent a team led by country representative Gauden Galea to check conditions on the ground in Wuhan, an inland city of more than 11 million people.
Associated Press: WHO representative addresses China’s new virus outbreak
(from L to R)-: Dr. Maria D Van Kerkhove, Head AI Emerging Diseases and Zoonoses Unit, World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Professor Didier Houssin, Chair of the Emergency Committee, and WHO health emergencies programme Michael Ryan sit together for a press conference following an emergency committee meeting over new SARS-like virus spreading in China and other nations, in Geneva on January 22, 2020. - The coronavirus has sparked alarm because of its similarity to the outbreak of SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) that killed nearly 650 people across mainland China and Hong Kong in 2002-03.
