Covid-19 timeline: Zero to 100 000 in 10 weeks

Daily situation reports released by the World Health Organisation (WHO) highlight the dramatic spread of the coronavirus around the world.

On 31 December last year, the WHO China Country Office was informed of cases of pneumonia with an unknown cause detected in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China. From 31 December 2019 through to 3 January 2020, a total of 44 case-patients with pneumonia of unknown cause were reported to WHO by the national authorities in China. The Chinese authorities identified a new type of coronavirus, which was isolated on 7 January.

On 20 January, the WHO released its first report stating that 282 cases of 2019-nCoV (now known as Covid-19 had been reported) . The majority of these cases were from China with two cases in Thailand, one case in Japan and one case in the Republic of Korea. These cases were all transported from China.

Just one week later, on 28 January, the WHO reported that there were 4 593 confirmed cases globally, with the cases mainly limited to China.

One month following the first situation report (20 February), there were 75 748 confirmed cases of coronavirus worldwide.

The first case of coronavirus in Africa was confirmed in Algeria on 26 February.

The South African Minister of Health, Zweli Mkhize, notified the public of the first case in South Africa on 5 March. Globally, there were 95 324 confirmed cases on this date. Just over 80 000 of these were in China while the rest of the cases were reported in 85 countries, five of which confirmed the first case.

On 7 March, the first 100 000 cases had been reported globally. It took approximately ten weeks to reach this number of cases, since the first 44 cases were reported late December last year.

However, it took just under two weeks for the WHO to report that an additional 100 000 cases had been confirmed worldwide.

As of 26 March, there were 462 684 confirmed cases and 20 834 deaths. In Africa, there have been 1 937 confirmed cases and 31 deaths. South Africa reported its first two deaths due to the virus on 27 March.

Share your thoughts on the spread of the coronavirus on our Facebook page

Notice: Coronavirus reporting at Caxton Local Media aims to combat fake news

Dear reader,

As your local news provider, we have the duty of keeping you factually informed on Covid-19 developments. As you may have noticed, mis- and disinformation (also known as “fake news”) is circulating online. Caxton Local Media is determined to filter through the masses of information doing the rounds and to separate truth from untruth in order to keep you adequately informed. Local newsrooms follow a strict pre-publication fact-checking protocol. A national task team has been established to assist in bringing you credible news reports on Covid-19.

Readers with any comments or queries may contact National Group Editor Irma Green (irma@caxton.co.za) or Legal Adviser Helene Eloff (helene@caxton.co.za).