Dubai – Masaader News
International Rescue Committee (IRC) is warning of the spread of the Coronavirus in the world. IRC says that the world could see up to 1 billion infections and 3.2 million deaths due to COVID-19 over the course of the pandemic in 34 crisis-affected countries served by the IRC[2], including warzones like Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen.
David Miliband, President and CEO of the International Rescue Committee, said: “These numbers should serve as a wake-up call: the full, devastating and disproportionate weight of this pandemic has yet to be felt in the world’s most fragile and war-torn countries. We are still in the critical window of time to mount a robust preventative response to the early stages of COVID-19 in many of these countries and prevent a further perpetuation of this epidemic globally.”
Preliminary estimates compiled by IRC are based on epidemiological modelling and data produced by Imperial College London and the World Health Organization. This model takes into account the age structure, household size, and social contact patterns of different countries, as well as mortality patterns from the early outbreak in China. IRC’s calculations for the 34 countries in which we work highlight the extent of the burden on fragile countries of the COVID-19 outbreak, and the importance of immediate actions in coming weeks to influence the trajectory of the epidemic.
Scientists are still studying the drivers of the pandemic in lower-income contexts, including factors such as population health risks which may drive infection rates up, or others such as younger population age structure which may drive mortality rates down; these figures are nevertheless sufficient to spark significant alarm on the international trajectory of COVID-19.