The World Health Organisation (WHO) is coordinating trials on several possible medications for the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19), WHO Chief Tedros Ghebreyesus said as the global infection number surpassed 200,000.
“Multiple small trials with different methods may not give us the clear, strong evidence we need about which treatments help to save lives,” Tedros told a news conference in Geneva on Wednesday.
“This large, international study is designed to generate the robust data we need, to show which treatments are the most effective,” he added.
So far, Argentina, Bahrain, Canada, France, Iran, Norway, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, and Thailand had said they would join the project.
Tedros said that the number of confirmed infections from the virus had overshot 200,000, with 8,000 Covid-19 respiratory disease patients having died so far.
More than 80 per cent of these cases were reported from Asia and Europe. (dpa/NAN)
