Denmark is on coronavirus lockdown, making the country the second in Europe to grind to a halt as the life-threatening disease rips across the continent.
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen declared that all Danish schools, universities, and kindergartens will be shut for two weeks to slow the spread of the bug.
Tough new measures will also include banning indoor events with 100 or more participants, and sending non-critical public sector employees home.
Private sector workers will also be encouraged to work from home, after the Danish Patient Safety Authority reported 442 new cases yesterday.
The urgent action follows the World Health Organization’s designation of coronavirus as a pandemic, as it blasted ‘inactive’ governments for fueling the crisis.
Pictured: Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen holds a press conference on the escalating coronavirus crisis in her country, in Copenhagen, March 10, 2020
In a press conference this evening, Ms Frederiksen said: ‘This will have huge consequences, but the alternative would be far worse.
‘Under normal circumstances, a government would not present such far-reaching measures without having all the solutions ready for the many Danes concerned.
‘But we are in an extraordinary situation.’
According to The Local, the Prime Minister added: ‘We will not get through this as a country without a cost. Businesses will close. Some will lose their jobs.
‘We will do what we can to mitigate the consequences for employees.’
Søren Brostrøm, director of the The Danish Health Authority, called the disease ‘not only a threat for Denmark, but for the whole world’.
Yesterday, the Danish Government announced that it would shift its coronavirus strategy from ‘containment’ to ‘delay’ as the number of cases rose.
The move signalled the new effort to divert resources from preventing the infection coming to Denmark to slowing down its spread domestically.
It comes as the WHO today blamed ‘alarming levels of inaction’ by governments across the planet for fueling the coronavirus crisis.
The UN agency said it was ‘deeply concerned by the alarming levels of spread and anxiety’ as the number of global confirmed cases surpassed 112,000.
Director-General of the UN agency Dr Tedros Adhanom also blasted governments for ignoring repeated WHO pleas to take urgent and aggressive action, with cases of the deadly illness outside of China having risen 13-fold in the space of a fortnight because of escalating crises in Italy, Iran, Spain, Germany, and France.
The WHO said: ‘Pandemic is not a word to use lightly or carelessly.
‘It is a word that, if misused, can cause unreasonable fear, or unjustified acceptance that the fight is over, leading to unnecessary suffering and death.’
Pictured: WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus at a press briefing, March 9
Denmark’s Prime Minister has preempted Boris Johnson’s anticipated decision to formally move the UK into the ‘delay phase’ of battling coronavirus.
The Prime Minister will chair an emergency Cobra meeting tomorrow, and meet with Labour figures to brief them on planned emergency laws – including closing schools, banning large gatherings, and ordering the country to work from home.
His administration was accused of ‘playing roulette’ with people’s lives as the eighth confirmed death in the UK by the disease was announced today.
Richard Horton, chief editor of the prestigious Lancet medical journal, blasted the Government’s dithering, saying: ‘The UK Government – Matt Hancock and Boris Johnson – claim they are following the science.
‘But that is not true. The evidence is clear. We need urgent implementation of social distancing and closure policies.
‘The Government is playing roulette with the public. This is a major error.’
One UK victim was a woman in her 70s with underlying health problems from Dudley, West Midlands. The second was an ‘elderly patient’ with a number of chronic conditions at the George Eliot Hospital in Warwickshire.
Britain also suffered its highest spike in cases in a single day amid fears Britain is hurtling towards an Italy-style crisis. Infections soared to 458, up by 85 in a 24-hour period, meaning the outbreak has risen five-fold in a week.
Meanwhile, more than 100 Britons who were stranded on board the Grand Princess cruise liner off the coast of San Francisco due to coronavirus fears landed in Birmingham Airport to begin self-isolation at home.