The Chi-Com government along with the WHO are the reason this virus became a pandemic. Here is the best I can do to piece together what happene dand why the virus spread beyond the Wuhan Province.  The government supressed information.  The Chi-Coms silenced doctors who attempted to sound the warning bells about the dangers posed by the novel coronavirus, and used their influence over the WHO (for reasons we can only guess) to supress the truth for weeks.  Some specualte that had they not done this, that the spread of the virus could have been cut by 95%.   YES. All of the blame, most likely due to incmpetence, lies right at the feet of Xi Jinping and the communist government.  

The US and the rest of the west eere slow to react to the threat becuse they were listening to the WHO and the garbage taht was being spread by the Chi-Com government.   Here is a timeline I put together that illustrates China's malfesiance.  

• 30 December 2o19- Dr Li Wenliang saw a patient's report of a SARS Coronavirus infection that was not responding to normal treatments. He took pitcurtes of the report, circling "SARS Coronavirus" and sent it to another doctor at another hospital in Wuhan. (Zhuang Pinghui, South China Morning Press 7 Feb 2020) Li said that that his report spread faster than he had expected and essentially went viral through the medical community in Wuhan.  There is a lot more to this story here, but to sum i up, Li was reprimanded by the Police and forced to sign a letter admitting he spread false rumors.  He later contracted the virus and died on 3 February 2020. 
• 31 December 2019- according to a story in the FInancial Times the Taiwan CDC reported to the WHO that they had received reports from medical workers in mainland China that the mecial workers were being infected by an unknown virus.
  

  Taiwan said its doctors had heard from mainland colleagues that medical staff were getting ill — a sign of human-to-human transmission. Taipei officials said they reported this to both International Health Regulations (IHR), a WHO framework for exchange of epidemic prevention and response data between 196 countries, and Chinese health authorities on December 31.

• 14 January 2020-WHO parrots the Chi-Com Goverment's conclusion that there was no evidence of human to human spread of the novel coronavirus. 

• 20 January 2020-China finally admits human-to-human transmission the coronavirus.  (The Guardian)
• 7 Febuary 2020 Li Wenlaing dies from COVID-19.  
• 11 March 2020-WHO delcares COVID-19 a global pandemic. 

Soon after Americans hoard toilet paper.