Countries will also strive to become less dependent on one another, especially for essential goods and services such as food or critical medical supplies, the prime minister said.

“This will have strategic implications. Countries will have less stake in each other’s wellbeing. They will fight more over how the pie is shared, rather than work together to enlarge the pie for all. It will be a less prosperous world, and also a more troubled one. All these changes will impact Singapore greatly and mean that the next few years will be a disruptive and difficult time,” he cautioned.

Researchers from a high-level expert team organised by the National Health Commission (NHC) confirmed that the virus was transmissible among humans for the first time on January 19, hours before they notified the public, and less than a month before the experts were alerted by the newly-discovered disease, it said.According to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the coronavirus has infected over 68,00,000 people and killed nearly 4,00,000 across the world. The US is the worst affected country with over 1.9 million cases and more than 1,09,000 deaths, while the total number of cases in China stand at 84,177.