Timeline: COVID-19 spreading worldwide in 2020

  • 3 years ago
타임라인으로 보는 2020년 전세계 코로나 상황

The outbreak of the novel coronavirus has affected many aspects of our lives.
And, as of the last day of year 2020,... COVID-19 cases worldwide has reached over 82 million.
Jang Tae-hyun goes through this year's COVID-19 timeline.
At the very end of 2019, a new virus emerged that would throw the next year into chaos.
This virus is called SARS-CoV-2, which belongs to the family of coronaviruses, named for the crown-like spikes on their surfaces.
It's the same group as prior outbreaks like SARS and MERS and can spread through droplets, affecting the human respiratory system.
The novel coronavirus appears to have emerged from Wuhan, China... at a seafood market.
The first cases of a mysterious pneumonia were detected last December in Wuhan and reported to the World Health Organization.
The Chinese health authorities shut down the market after it was discovered that wild animals sold there could have been the source of the virus.
Wuhan, home to 11 million people, was put under strict lockdown,... and no one was allowed to leave the city.
By this point, there were cases in many other countries too.
The world watched as a cluster of cases grew on a cruise ship docked in Japan... called the Diamond Princess,... leading to more than 3,700 passengers being quarantined on board for about a month.
More than 700 passengers tested positive and 14 died.
In March, the WHO acknowledged that what many had feared... had come true.
"We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterized as a pandemic."
As cases surged in South Korea, the country mounted a swift and efficient response.
It rolled out innovative ways of testing, like drive-thru and walk-thru, and this was the start of social distancing.
Eventually, all schools would switch to online classes, but the initial response was a combination of online learning... and distancing in the classroom.
"When high school seniors come back to school, this will be the new normal in the COVID-19 era."
In Europe, the first few months saw a surge of the virus in Italy, Spain and the UK, leading to some of the harshest lockdowns of the pandemic.
To date, the continent has reported about 30 percent of the world's COVID-19 death toll.
By far the highest number of cases in the world are in the United States.
The first cases detected there sparked panic buying of basic necessities.
In the autumn, President Trump and the First Lady Melania Trump tested positive... as did many other White House officials.
South America has seen an especially bad economic impact.
Companies have gone bankrupt, laying off workers who now struggle even to buy food.
By November, drugmakers were starting to announce that they had successfully developed safe vaccines, bringing hope that life could soon return to normal.
The first person in the world to get the vaccine made by Pfizer as part of the official rollout... was a 90-year-old woman in the UK.
Days later, vaccines were administered in the U.S., Isr