HIGHLIGHTS

• Two new countries/territories/areas from the Region of the Americas [2] have reported cases of COVID-19.

• The total global number of COVID-19 cases has surpassed 500 000.

• Addressing the Extraordinary Summit on COVID-19, the WHO Director-General called on G20 leaders to fight, unite, and ignite against COVID-19. More information can be found here.

• WHO concluded the technical support mission to Egypt on 25 March 2020. More information can be found on the Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office site here.

• OpenWHO celebrates 1 million enrollments today. Seventy percent of the total enrollments are on COVID-19 resources, reflecting the critical role the platform is playing in supporting the response to the pandemic. On 25 March, a new course was launched describing how to design and operate treatment centres for the COVID-19 pandemic. COVID-19 resources are hosted on two learning channels: one for courses in official WHO languages here and a second for courses in additional national languages here.

• The number of countries implementing additional health measures that significantly interfere with international traffic has increased since the declaration of COVID-19 as a public health emergency of international concern. The United Nations World Tourism Organization launched a Crisis Committee to review the impact of the outbreak on the aviation, shipping and tourism sectors and propose innovative solutions for recovery. Greater detail can be found in Subject in Focus overleaf. Figure 1. Countries, territories or areas with reported confirmed cases of COVID-19, 27 March 2020

** Source WHO website