The Coronavirus Is Slowing Down in China but It’s Spreading Faster in Other Parts of the World

Here’s some good news about the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) that has been making its way around the world.

Since February 19, the daily number of recovered coronavirus patients has been outstripping the number of new infections. This waning spread of the coronavirus is felt most strongly in China, which has taken extreme precautions such as strict quarantine measures.

According to Johns Hopkins University, there were 439 new cases and about 1,800 recoveries as of February 19. Since then, daily confirmed coronavirus cases have not exceeded 600 and measure consistently less than the number of daily recoveries.

While the number of cases continues to increase globally, the rate of coronavirus transmission is abating. From February 14 to 17, there were more than 2,000 cases being reported daily, but since February 19, the figure has been less than 1,000.

This is certainly good news. From these numbers alone, it seems like we’ve made it through the worst of the epidemic. But we can’t relax just yet.

A closer look at the statistics reveals that, while China may be benefiting from its intense outbreak management efforts, things could still get worse for the rest of the world.

Beyond China, the number of coronavirus cases has been climbing at a faster rate than before. On February 24, the total number of coronavirus cases outside mainland China stood at 2,400.

Now, there are coronavirus cases recorded in almost every continent. As of February 27, the only region where there are no reported cases of coronavirus is Antartica.

Still, not everyone agrees that the current coronavirus situation is a pandemic. According to World Health Organization chief Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, while the coronavirus has potential to become a pandemic, there is not yet an “uncontained global spread”, the BBC reported.

However, the recent spike in cases in South Korea, Italy, and Iran are ominously symptomatic of a pandemic infection. As a budding pandemic, the coronavirus appears to be transitioning from the initiation phase to the acceleration phase in the Pandemic Intervals Framework.

This is especially worrying, considering the startling fatality rate of the coronavirus in Iran. Out of 95 infected cases in the country as of Wednesday, February 26, 16 people have died. It is now the country with the highest death toll outside of China, a worrying figure since COVID-19 is not supposed to be that deadly. In China, the fatality rate of the virus is 2.3 percent.

Having to deal with the unexpected threat of the coronavirus at the start of 2020 has been detrimental to global GDPs. While China is expected to suffer the most damage in terms of reduced GDP growth, global economic interdependencies ensure that economic losses will reverberate across other economies including Japan and the United States.

Stock markets also took a collective plunge in February, reflecting global worries about the worsening coronavirus spread.

Whether or not the coronavirus will develop into a full-blown pandemic remains to be seen over the next few weeks. Despite statistical optimism, we can’t let our guards down just yet.

Update on 02/27/20: A previous version of this article stated that South America was the only continent with no coronavirus case. This is no longer the case. As of today, Antartica is the only continent with no coronavirus case.

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