An independent panel said on Monday that Chinese officials could have applied public health measures more forcefully in January to curb the initial Covid-19 outbreak, and criticised the World Health Organisation (WHO) for not declaring an international emergency until Jan 30.

The experts reviewing the global handling of the pandemic, led by former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark and former Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, called for reforms to the Geneva-based United Nations agency. Their interim report was published hours after the WHO's top emergency expert, Mike Ryan, said that global deaths from COVID-19 were expected to top 100,000 per week "very soon".