SEVASTOPOL, March 18./TASS/. Russia will step up fight against the novel coronavirus, since Russians continue traveling around the globe despite the spread of the virus, President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday.

"Let me say once again - generally everything is under control here, and I hope things will remain the same in the future. We will be building up these efforts, given a lot of contacts," Putin said when he met with representatives of the Crimean and Sevastopol public.

Although the situation in Asia "is calming down, the Chinese have done good job, worked very efficiently," the situation in some other countries is worse. "Things are very bad in Europe, but our people are travelling to all places in vast numbers," the president added.

"It is difficult to comment, some people had plans, buying tours or tickets in advance, others devised their holidays the way ‘now or never’. Some others simply miscalculated the situation, they didn’t know that this or that country will close the borders, and they really get into difficulty," the president added.

In late December 2019, Chinese authorities notified the World Health Organization (WHO) about an outbreak of a previously unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, central China. On March 11, 2020, the WHO officially characterized the situation with the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) as a pandemic. The disease has spread to over 130 countries. The number of coronavirus infection cases in the world has exceeded 200,000, while 8,000 people have died, the World Health Organization (WHO) Secretary General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus announced Wednesday.

Russia reports 147 coronavirus cases.