Devex: COVID-19 is officially a pandemic, WHO says
“The World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic Wednesday. This declaration comes more than two months after the identification of the new coronavirus in Wuhan, China, with more than 118,000 cases and nearly 4,300 deaths in 114 countries to date. This is the first coronavirus outbreak to receive that label…” (Jerving, 3/11).

New York Times: Coronavirus Has Become a Pandemic, WHO Says
“… ‘We have rung the alarm bell loud and clear,’ said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO’s director-general. Dr. Tedros called for countries to learn from one another’s successes, act in unison, and help protect one another against a common threat. ‘Find, isolate, test, and treat every case, and trace every contact,’ Dr. Tedros said. ‘Ready your hospitals. Protect and train your health care workers’…” (McNeil, 3/11).

STAT: WHO declares the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic
“…Tedros used the fact that 90% of the cumulative cases have been reported in just four countries as evidence that the rest of the world still had time to prevent an explosion of cases with action. WHO officials also stressed that countries should be implementing a strategic combination of both containment and mitigation measures…” (Branswell/Joseph, 3/11).

Wall Street Journal: Coronavirus Declared Pandemic by World Health Organization
“…The WHO generally defines a pandemic as a disease that has become widespread around the world, with an impact on society. The term has been applied to only a few diseases in history — a deadly flu in 1918, the H1N1 flu in 2009 and HIV/AIDS among them. … The pandemic label doesn’t require new WHO recommendations. But the move could get more resources to a rapidly worsening situation, some health experts said…” (McKay et al., 3/11).

Additional coverage of the pandemic announcement is available from CNBC, CNN, Financial Times, NPR, POLITICO, PRI, U.N. News, USA TODAY, and Washington Post.