How did we get here?

In China at the end of December, a 34-year-old ophthalmologist named Dr Li Wenliang tried to send a message to other medics warning them about a new virus in the city of Wuhan in Hubei Province.

He was later visited by the police accused and accused of scaremongering. Dr Li died on 6 February after contracting the virus while treating patients in Wuhan.

Grief and anger after the death of Dr Li Wenliang
On 3 January, the BBC wrote its first news report about a "mystery virus" in Wuhan. At the time, 44 cases had been confirmed, 11 of which were considered severe.

Many feared there would be a repeat of the 2003 Sars outbreak that killed 774 people. By 18 January the confirmed number of cases had risen to around 60 - but experts estimated the real figure was closer to 1,700.

Just two days later, as millions of people prepared to travel for the lunar new year, the number of cases more than tripled to more than 200 and the virus was detected in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.

On 23 January, Wuhan went into lockdown. At that point, 18 people had died and 570 others had been infected, including in Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, South Korea and the United States.

Ten days later, a 44-year-old man in the Philippines died of the virus - the first death reported outside of China.

A week later, an 80-year-old tourist died in France - Europe's first coronavirus death. The virus appeared in Iran five days later - two people died within hours of their diagnosis being announced. Iran would later become a hotspot for the virus.

Italy saw a major surge in cases on 23 February, and 10 towns in Lombardy went into lockdown, later extended to the whole of Italy.

On 23 March, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced a three-week lockdown in the UK.

Three days later, on 26 March, the US officially overtook China as the country hardest-hit by the coronavirus outbreak, with more than 86,000 confirmed cases. By 2 April, this had risen to more than 217,000 - almost double the number of cases in Italy.

The situation is not getting better people.
Imagine 1,355 deaths in France alone within 24hrs.
This is so sad.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

So Africa is not part of the world.....abi

Wow