In the depths of the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009, international leaders banded together, held emergency meetings and pushed out stimulus to buttress the world economy, said a former Australian treasurer.

"Those sets of decisions meant that the global financial crisis, which became the Great Recession, didn't turn into the Great Depression," said Wayne Swan, who was Australia's treasurer from 2007 to 2013.

The "big difference" between the handling of that crisis and the current coronavirus outbreak, said Swan, is that there was global coordination back then.

"What's missing here with this health crisis, which is going to have profound economic effects as well, is that sort of determination for coordination," he told CNBC's Matthew Taylor on Friday.

Instead, there has been an "isolationist" approach, particularly in the United States, he said. "What is really absent is that sort of coordination and political leadership."

The world has scrambled to deal with the coronavirus pandemic that first began in China last year. It has since infected more than 125,000 globally and killed at least 4,600.

Besides China, countries such as Italy, Iran and South Korea have been hit hard by the virus as well.