A hundred days into the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic

Steffens, Ines

In January and February, the worldwide focus of attention was China where cases and fatalities increased day by day. Just 30 days after ProMed's post, on 29 January, 6,065 confirmed COVID-19 cases had been notified worldwide, mainly from China, where all 1,239 severe cases and 132 COVID-19 deaths were reported. At that point, only 68 cases had been identified in 15 countries outside mainland China, all of which had a link to China or to cases from China [3] (Figure) . By 28 February, 30 days later, 83,652 confirmed COVID-19 cases had been reported from 51 countries on all continents. Countries outside mainland China still accounted for only 4.5% (n = 3,664) of the notified cases with some, including Italy, Germany, and France in Europe, already experiencing limited autochthonous transmission. From late February, new infections in China declined rapidly after the implementation of sweeping social distancing measures, while attention turned to Europe, the new epicentre of the COVID-19 pandemic. Italy was initially the country hit the hardest by far, Spain, the Netherlands and others followed;