Zafar Mirza says Facebook to help Pakistan fight against coronavirus

ISLAMABAD: With the 19 confirmed coronavirus cases in Pakistan, the Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Zafar Mirza said that Facebook will run a public awareness campaign on its platform for Pakistani users to combat the spread of coronavirus in the country, ARY News reported.

The development comes during the meeting of the Facebook delegation who called on Special Assistant to Prime Minister on Health Dr Zafar Mirza here in Islamabad on Thursday. Issues related to coronavirus were discussed in detail during the meeting.

Zafar Mirza said that Facebook delegation has offered Pakistan to run an awareness campaign to combat the novel COVID-19 in the country. He said that there are millions of Pakistani users on Facebook and the step will country in the fight against corona.

The Facebook international delegation member Guilin Zhou said the social media website will remove the misinformation regarding coronavirus from Facebook.

On Wednesday, the second coronavirus case was reported from Gilgit-Baltistan reported, raising Pakistan’s tally of total confirmed cases to 19.

According to Gilgit Baltistan government spokesperson, a 14-year-old boy was diagnosed with novel coronavirus at a City Hospital in Skardu.

COVID-19 ‘can be characterised as a pandemic

The new coronavirus outbreak can now be characterised as a pandemic, the head of the World Health Organization said Wednesday.

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he was alarmed by the spread and severity of the outbreak, along with a lack of action taken to combat it.

“COVID-19 can be characterised as a pandemic,” he told reporters in Geneva. He said he expected the number of cases and deaths would grow in the coming days and weeks.

“We have never before seen a pandemic sparked by a coronavirus,” he said. He also said hard-hit Iran was trying its best to control the outbreak but needed more supplies.