Thomas Peter/Reuters
President Donald Trump and China's President Xi Jinping arrive at a state dinner at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, November 9, 2017.
- As of April 10, the COVID-19 pandemic has infected more than 1.6 million people and killed at least 102,000 worldwide, leaving countries scrambling for protective resources and struggling to treat new patients.
- Even as outbreaks have stormed the globe, many world leaders denied the severity of the virus at first.
- Mixed messaging from politicians across the globe led to a late start for countries containing the virus outbreak in China, Italy, the US, and others.
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We watched the case counts rise in China. Healthcare workers shared harrowing accounts from the frontlines as China panic-built hospitals in a matter of days.
Doctors weren't sure how to treat this new coronavirus, and the Chinese government eventually locked down an estimated 50 million people to contain the disease.
But it took some world leaders months to take the threat seriously.
As death toll creeps higher every day, over one-third of the world has now been placed under lockdown, and countries are scrambling to halt the spread of COVID-19.
Here are eight world leaders who didn't take the novel coronavirus seriously at first, possibly putting their countries at greater risk for infection during crucial early moments.
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