UNITED NATIONS, June 11 (Xinhua) -- United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Thursday that the digital divide is now "a matter of life and death" for people who are unable to access essential healthcare information.

"It is threatening to become the new face of inequality, reinforcing the social and economic disadvantages suffered by women and girls, people with disabilities and minorities of all kinds," the UN chief said at the Virtual High-level Meeting of Rapid Technological Change on the Achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals.

"Digital technology is central to almost every aspect of the response to the (COVID-19) pandemic, from vaccine research to online learning models, e-commerce and tools that are enabling hundreds of millions of people to work and study from home," said the secretary-general.

The UN chief cited statistics as saying that in 2019, some 87 percent of people in developed countries used the internet, compared with just 19 percent in the least developed countries.

"At the same time, COVID-19 has provided dramatic evidence of the threats posed by the ungoverned use of digital technology, from exclusion and inequality, to surveillance, human rights abuses and cybercrime," he said.

"The pandemic has ushered in some of the most intrusive surveillance technologies we have ever seen, together with a significant increase in cynical ransomware attacks on hospitals and healthcare facilities," the UN chief added.

Guterres said, "We are at a turning point. We urgently need to harness the infinite opportunities offered by digital technology in order to scale up our efforts on healthcare, on the climate crisis, on eradicating poverty, and across all the Sustainable Development Goals."

"To realize these opportunities, we must move forward in the digital age with increased international cooperation based on mutual trust," he said. "We cannot reap the full benefits of the digital age without mobilizing global cooperation to close digital gaps and reduce potential harms."

Guterres called for "global vision and leadership" for a "digitally interdependent world."