isolated selfie

The COVID-19 pandemic has spread to all corners of the globe and the following infographic shows the last places on Earth remaining unaffected. It is based on countries that have not reported any known COVID-19 cases and that remained absent from the extensive global tracking carried out by the Johns Hopkins University as of March 30, 2020.

There are certainly question marks regarding the true situation in some countries, particularly North Korea, with sources in South Korea claiming COVID-19 has indeed spread there via the Chinese border. Due to the secretive nature of the government in Pyongyang and the degree of state control over the media, it is impossible to tell whether the South Korean claims are true. However, it is also not unreasonable to think that in this instance, North Korea's isolation from the rest of the world is helping it largely avoid the pandemic.

Several countries in Africa are still saying that they have no COVID-19 cases, though again this could be due to a lack of testing capacity on the ground. As of March 30, Botswana, Burundi, Comoros, Malawi, Sao Tome, and Principe, Sierra Leone and South Sudan were the African countries still to report a confirmed case. The virus also remains mostly undetected in the smaller Pacific island nations such as the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.