The Battle Against COVID-19 in Jordan: From Extreme Victory to Extreme Burden

摘要

Since the emergence of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, massive public health interventions have beenimplemented to contain the outbreak (1). However, within a few weeks, the virus had spread rapidlythroughout China and within 1 month to several other countries (2). As of November 25th, 2020,worldwide, more than 60 million people were confirmed to have the novel coronavirus, with morethan 1.42 million deaths (3). In Jordan, the first case of COVID-19 was discovered on March 2nd,2020 when the government implemented an immediate and large range of non-pharmaceuticalinterventions to combat the spread of the virus (4). Patients were immediately and completelyisolated in specialized hospitals, and quarantine was initiated as per official guidelines to medicalprofessionals and using all personal protective equipment (5). These interventions were empoweredby the activation of the National Defense Law on March 17th, 2020. The activation of the law led tothe suspension of studies at educational institutions, closure of borders, stopping prayers in placesof worship, and banning all large gatherings.