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WHO Russia envoy recommends going ahead with planned treatment if possible

She also stressed that the main thing is to ensure that each hospital is absolutely safe from the infection to prevent patients in critical condition from contracting coronavirus which can lead to complications

MOSCOW, March 26. /TASS/. Planned medical care, particularly the high-tech one, should not be cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic, however, it is vital to ensure absolute infection safety inside each hospital, WHO representative to Russia Melita Vujnovic told the Future of Russia. National Projects web portal operated by TASS on Thursday.

"Nobody is abandoning urgent care. Planned medical help can be stretched out a little if possible. But it should be the doctors doing it who make this decision," she said, answering a question what patients who were supposed to soon receive medical treatment should do now.

According to her, resolving the planned medical care issue amid the coronavirus pandemic largely depends on each country’s capabilities. "Russia has quite serious capabilities, I think we will very soon see that the local healthcare will review each case and will do whatever’s needed," Vujnovic believes.

She also stressed that the main thing is to ensure that each hospital is absolutely safe from the infection to prevent patients in critical condition from contracting coronavirus which can lead to various complications. "Good infection control should be in place," she concluded.

In late December 2019, Chinese authorities notified the World Health Organization (WHO) about the outbreak of a previously unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, central China. Since then, cases of the novel coronavirus - named COVID-19 by the WHO - have been reported in more than 150 countries.

On March 11, the WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. As of now, over 457,000 people have been infected around the world and more than 21,000 have died. Russia identified 840 cases, while 38 people recovered, and two people died.