MOSCOW, July 2. /TASS/. China should be seen as the first country hit by the coronavirus pandemic rather than the one that spread the disease, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov said on Thursday in an interview with TASS First Deputy Director General Mikhail Gusman.
"We believe that we can all benefit from the experience of China, which was the first victim of COVID-19 rather than the country that spread it, which was able to overcome that epidemic, at least stopped its spread on its soil," he said. According to Morgulov, Russia adheres to this approach and works closely with China on the whole range of issues related to combating the pandemic and preventing new outbreaks.
"Frankly speaking, I find it difficult to understand the logic of the Americans who, instead of looking for an opportunity to pool efforts in the face of a common threat, began to look for someone to blame, almost seeking compensation from Beijing and putting forward similar demands. Of course, no one has anything against tracing the origin of the coronavirus, we have nothing against it, but not in order to blame someone for that, but to understand how to fight that infection in the best possible way and prevent similar pandemics in the future," he added.
In late December 2019, Chinese officials notified the World Health Organization (WHO) about the outbreak of a previously unknown pneumonia in the city of Wuhan, in central China. Since then, cases of the novel coronavirus - named COVID-19 by the WHO - have been reported in every corner of the globe, including Russia. On March 11, 2020, the WHO declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic. According to the latest statistics, over 10,820,000 people have been infected worldwide and more than 519,000 deaths have been reported.