As deadly Cyclone Harold churns through the South Pacific, small island nations in its path are struggling to balance responses to the disaster with maintaining efforts to stop the spread of the coronavirus outbreak, officials warned on Wednesday.

A bird is seen near a drying reservoir in Mt. Darwin, Zimbabwe, Oct. 11, 2019. Zimbabwe is facing severe food shortages due to a combination of drought and cyclone this year. Photo: Xinhua

Cyclone Harold ripped through Vanuatu and Fiji as a deadly top-strength storm this week, causing injuries and damage to property, and severing communications.

Before that, it left 27 people missing and presumed dead in the Solomon Islands after they were swept off a ferry in rough seas.

The storm is now headed toward Tonga and expected to land there on Thursday or Friday, emergency officials said.

The cyclone forced Vanuatu, which has yet to report a case of the COVID-19 infection, to suspend social distancing rules intended to combat the virus, Red Cross officials said.

The island state's leaders also are rethinking new border restrictions imposed to head off a virus outbreak, they said.

"It's an incredibly challenging time right across the globe, and it's hard to imagine a worse time for a mega-storm like this to hit," Luke Ebbs, Vanuatu director for charity Save the Children, said in a statement.

Tonga has just "a handful" of intensive care beds for a popu¬lation of 100,000, to treat both storm injuries and potential cases of COVID-19.