Back in late February, a month or so into the COVID-19 pandemic, the World Health Organization was warning of the dangers of the disease, about its potential to spread and to kill, and about the critical need to test for the virus. A few countries in south-east and east Asia were very quick off the mark, especially those that had experienced SARS seventeen years earlier. But most European states were slow to take it seriously, even when Italy was suddenly plunged into crisis and forced to opt for very strong lockdowns.
As openDemocracy reported right back in the spring, in theory the UK had an excellent National Biosecurity Strategy but failed lamentably to follow it and ended up with one of the worst records of disease control in the first few months. The US under Donald Trump was even more dilatory, and he persists in claiming COVID-19 is beaten even as the country edges closer to a quarter of a million deaths.
As the first wave in Europe was starting to ease back in June, the WHO was once again warnings of dangers ahead, this time the risk of further waves starting later in the year. That is now happening at a pace that has exceeded the fears of health professionals as, time and again, COVID-19 has been underestimated. The Czech Republic really thought it had been successful until very recently but now fears the disease is out of control, France and Spain are heading into lockdowns and even Germany is hugely concerned in spite of its early success.
