(Geneva) The World Health Organization expressed concern on Wednesday over the rise in COVID-19 cases around the world, even as people are getting fewer and fewer screens.
Posted at 1:10 p.m.
“Over the past week, we have seen an 8% increase in detected cases, with more than 11 million cases reported to WHO, and this despite a significant reduction in testing globally,” said WHO expert Maria Van Kerkhove at a press conference.
The person who has been in charge of the fight against COVID-19 at the WHO since its appearance at the end of 2019 believes that the upsurge in the number of cases is the result of a “combination of factors”.
The wave of infections is largely fueled by Omicron’s BA.2 sub-variant, which is already supplanting its BA.1 sibling in some countries. Without question, BA.2 “is the most contagious variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that we have seen so far”, insisted Mme Van Kerkhove.
Added to this is the lifting of health measures taken against COVID-19 in many countries, which gives the virus “the opportunity to spread”, as well as incomplete vaccination coverage in many parts of the world.
Finally, the WHO expert deplores the misinformation about COVID-19 that is circulating at very high levels: some say that Omicron is benign and that it is the last variant the world will face, other than the pandemic is over… “all this is causing great confusion”, which benefits the virus.
“So we are seeing an increase in detected cases around the world for a number of reasons. These are the same factors that have caused the transmission of this virus since the start of the pandemic,” concluded Mr.me Van Kerkhove.
But the good news, she said, is that the world has the means to deal with it, before repeating her creed: mask, physical distancing, vaccines, screening, treatments…