WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

Key Highlights He said the future of the COVID-19 pandemic to a great extent depends on how “hugely-populated countries such as India and China do to tackle this health crisis” So far, over 450 people have contracted the virus in India, with 9 people succumbing to the disease Globally, the positive cases have aggressively surged past 378,000 and over 16,000 people have fallen prey to this deadly virus, the worst affected being Italy, China, Spain and Iran

Geneva: The World Health Organisation on Monday hailed India’s efforts to combat pandemics in the past and said that how we handle the COVID-19 pandemic since we have a history of tackling severe pandemics efficiently in the past.

Addressing the media on Tuesday in Geneva, WHO executive director Michael J Ryan said that India has tremendous capacity to handle the coronavirus outbreak as it has a history of eradicating pandemics such as the small-pox and polio.

He said that the future of the COVID-19 pandemic to a great extent depends on how “hugely-populated countries such as India and China do to tackle this health crisis”.

“India is a hugely populous country. The future of this pandemic to a great extent will be determined to what happens to densely populated countries. It’s really important that India continues to take aggressive action at the public health level, and at the level of society to control, suppress this disease and save lives,” Ryan said.

He further said that India has had a history of eliminating ‘silent killers’ such as polio and has done a “tremendous job” at it.

“India led the world in eradicating silent killers such as the small pox... India, through targeted public health interaction, ended that disease and gave a great gift to the world... India also eliminated polio, another silent killer and did a tremendous job. India has tremendous capacities,” he said.

India braces

The WHO top official’s remark came at a time when the confirmed cases in India are rising every day, forcing the government to enforce lockdown measures to contain the pandemic. The consequences of an unprecedented outbreak in India are unfathomable as it could cause a situation of emergency in a country like India which has a population of over 130 crore people.

So far, over 450 people have contracted the virus in India, with 9 people succumbing to the disease. Globally, the positive cases have aggressively surged past 378,000 and over 16,000 people have fallen prey to this deadly virus, the worst affected being Italy, China, Spain and Iran.

As many as 30 states and Union Territories in India enforced complete lockdown by Monday evening, spanning 548 districts, as the positive cases in India continued to spike at a steady rate.

The national capital of Delhi, Maharashtra, Bihar, Tripura, Assam, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Jammu & Kashmir, Ladakh, Punjab, Gujarat, Karnataka are among the states and UTs have imposed complete lockdown so far.

Apart from these, three states and/or UTs have imposed partial lockdown. Uttar Pradesh (India’s most populous state) Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and Lakshwadweep (UT) have imposed partial lockdown.

Only Sikkim and Mizoram haven’t imposed any restrictions so far.

For full coverage on coronavirus pandemic, click here.