GENEVA: The World Health Organization warned on Saturday (Apr 25) that recovery from coronavirus might not protect a person from reinfection as the global death toll from the pandemic surpassed 200,000.
Hundreds of millions of Muslims around the world spent the second day of the Ramadan holy month out of mosques and avoiding large family meals to break the fast because of sequestration and social distancing policies.
And Australians and New Zealanders marked Anzac Day without the normal parades and public ceremonies to commemorate fallen soldiers. Instead, under social distancing policies, people held dawn vigils in front of their homes.
Even as governments from Sri Lanka to Belgium to the United States began moving in the direction of partial reopening, the COVID-19 pandemic still had nearly half of humanity under some form of lockdown or confinement
The WHO warned on Saturday that there was still no evidence that people who test positive for the new coronavirus and recover are immunised and protected against reinfection.
The warning came as some governments study measures such as “immunity passports” or documents for those who have recovered as one way to get people back to work after weeks of economic shutdown.
“There is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from #COVID19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection,” WHO said in a statement.
“People who assume that they are immune to a second infection because they have received a positive test result may ignore public health advice,” it said.
Total cases around the world rose to 2.86 million and deaths mounted past the 200,000 mark, doubling since Apr 10, according to an AFP tally.
Europe, the hardest-hit region, has recorded 122,171 coronavirus deaths. The United States has seen the highest number of deaths for a single country with 53,070 fatalities, followed by Italy at 26,384, Spain 22,902, France 22,614 and the United Kingdom 20,319.
