WHO Situation Report 20/02/2020

World Health Organisation Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)
Situation Report – 31

One new country (Islamic Republic of Iran) reported cases of COVID-19 in the past 24 hours.

China has revised their guidance on case classification for COVID-19, removing the classification of “clinically diagnosed” previously used for Hubei province, and retaining only “suspected” and “confirmed” for all areas, the latter requiring laboratory confirmation. Some previously reported “clinically diagnosed” cases are thus expected to be discarded over the coming days as laboratory testing is conducted and some are found to be COVID-19-negative.

In early January, following the notification of the occurrence of cases of
COVID-19 among travelers from Wuhan, China, WHO established a Global Surveillance System to collect and organize essential information to describe and monitor COVID-19. All WHO regions have implemented the reporting of COVID-19 cases either through existing or newly-established data collection systems. Please see the Subject in Focus section for more information.