The coronavirus spread further on Friday, with cases reported for the first time in six countries across three continents, battering markets and leading the World Health Organization (WHO) to raise its impact risk alert to “very high.”
Hopes that the epidemic that started in China late last year would be over in months, and that economic activity would quickly return to normal, have been shattered.
World shares were on course for their largest weekly fall since the 2008 financial crisis, bringing the global wipeout to $6 trillion as supply chains were disrupted, travel plans postponed and major events canceled.
