**2. The advent and global spread of COVID-19**

COVID-19 or "Novel Coronavirus" was first identified or emerged in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. As noted by the World Health Organisation (WHO), there were reported cases of pneumonia of unknown cause in Wuhan City, China [6]. The WHO added that after careful observations by the Chinese authorities, a novel coronavirus was subsequently identified as the cause on 7 January 2020 and the virus was temporarily named "2019-nCoV" [6, 10]. As further noted by the WHO [11], coronaviruses (CoV) are a large family of viruses that cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases. WHO added that a novel coronavirus (nCoV) is a new strain that has not been previously identified in humans and the new virus was subsequently named the "COVID-19 virus" [6, 12]. In view of the potential deadly nature of this COVID-19 virus, on 30 January 2020, the World Health Organisation

#### *People's Perspectives on Covid 19, Fake News and the Vaccination Drive in South Africa DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.108933*

(WHO), through its Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, declared the novel coronavirus outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). At that time and according to WHO, there were 98 cases and no deaths in 18 countries outside China [6].

The COVID-19 virus appears to be very dangerous and with the capability to continue to spread across countries of the world at an alarming rate and as at 11 March 2020, there were increased reports of rapid increase in the number of cases outside China. This led the WHO Director-General to state that the outbreak could be declared as a pandemic with more than 118,000 cases reported in 114 countries, and 4291 deaths recorded as well. Statistics also revealed that by mid-March 2020, the European Region of the World Health Organisation (WHO) had become the epicentre of the epidemic, with over 40% of globally confirmed cases reported [11]. The virus quickly spread to 213 countries, areas or territories around the globe, and nearly 144,683 deaths were recorded worldwide as at 18 April 2020. Statistics also revealed that as of 28 April 2020, 63% of global mortality from the virus was from the European Region. It must however be noted that since the first cases of COVID-19 were reported, WHO has relentlessly worked hard to support countries and governments to prepare and respond to the pandemic through its transparent knowledge-sharing and tailored support on the ground [6].

Looking at the confirmed cases and statistics and how the number of infection rose astronomically showed that in November 2020, the WHO notes that the United States became the first country to have at least ten million confirmed cases. As at December 2020, India became the second country to have at least ten million confirmed cases of COVID-19. Brazil became the third country to have at least ten million confirmed cases In February 2021, while the United Kingdom became the fourth country to have at least ten million confirmed cases in November 2021 [13]. Statistics also showed that Russia became the fifth country to have at least ten million confirmed cases as at December 2021, while at the beginning of 2022, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in France, Italy and Turkey also stood at around ten million. Statistics also revealed that at the beginning of February 2022, Germany and Spain also joined the list of countries with at least ten million cases [13]. The number of confirmed cases continue to grow even in the year 2022 as South Korea joined the list of countries with at least ten million confirmed cases in March 2022, Vietnam in April 2022 and Japan in July 2022. Summarily, 13 countries have at least ten million confirmed cases as at August 2022. Globally, as at October 6, 2022, there are 616,951,418 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 6,530,281 confirmed death [13].
