Progress in fighting the Covid-19 virus is "extremely fragile", the World Health Organisation’s European director warned yesterday.
It would be "dangerous" to think that we are approaching an end to the pandemic, Dr Hans Kluge said.
"The virus leaves no room for error or complacency, we need to remain committed, aggressive, and vigilant across all regions, all countries, and in all communities," he said.
The UK, along with Italy, Spain, Belgium and Switzerland, is seeing higher than expected death rates from the virus, he warned. There is concern about a surge in deaths in Turkey, mainly in Istanbul, he said.
WHO yesterday dispatched a team to Belarus to provide "support and advice" amid concern at the country’s failure to implement a lock-down. He revealed that a Polish team had travelled to Brescia, Italy, to open the town’s sixth intensive care unit.
Dr Kluge said "very" careful consideration would be needed before any relaxation of lock-down rules.
He said: "At a minimum, to keep transmission suppressed, we must prioritise maintaining extensive testing, isolation and contact tracing measures and planning these ahead, including for the period when widespread physical distancing measures are slowly and gradually relaxed."
* Analysis of national figures show that Italy yesterday was on its 18th day of reporting more than 600 deaths a day. It has twice dropped below 600 in the last week.
Spain was on its 16th day of reporting more than 600 deaths daily and its 13th day of reporting more than 700 deaths.
The UK reported 938 new deaths yesterday while US states reported 1,897 deaths with 779 of them in New York State. The USA has now confirmed more than 430,000 cases of infection and 14,738 deaths with Spain totalling 14,792 deaths yesterday.
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