World Health Organization raises risk assessment of COVID-19 to 'very high'

With 4,351 cases outside of China, taking 67 lives across at least 48 countries, the WHO said health officials were seeing "linked epidemics of COVID-19 in several countries". However, they did note that most cases could still be linked back to known contacts or clusters.

"We have now increased our assessment of the risk of spread and the risk of impact of COVID-19 to very high at global level," said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of WHO.

Denmark, Estonia, Lithuania, the Netherlands and Nigeria all reported their first cases on Thursday, which Tedros said were all connected to the outbreak in Italy.

While Tedros warned that the virus could very well turn into a global pandemic, he urged against fear and panic.

He said: "Our greatest enemy right now is not the virus itself.

"It's fear, rumours and stigma."