GENEVA (AP) – A leading expert from the World Health Organization on the coronavirus pandemic said on Monday that the weekly global death toll from COVID-19 was rising again, a “worrying sign” after about six weeks of decline.
Maria Van Kerkhove, technical lead on COVID-19 at the UN health agency, said the growth follows a fifth consecutive week of confirmed cases increasing worldwide. She said the number of reported cases had increased in four of the six regions of the WHO, although there were significant variations in each region.
“In the past week, cases have increased by 8%,” Van Kerkhove told reporters. “In Europe, it’s 12% – and it’s driven by several countries.”
The increase is due in part to the spread of a variant that first originated in Britain and is now spreading to many other places, including Eastern Europe, she said.
South East Asia has reported a 49% jump from week to week in confirmed cases, while the WTO’s West Pacific region has reported a 29% increase, fueled mainly by the Philippines, Van Kerkhove said. said. In the eastern Mediterranean, cases increased by 8%, while the number of cases reported in the Americas and Africa decreased.
“I would like to mention that it was about six weeks where we saw a decrease in deaths,” Van Kerkhove said. ‘And in the last week we’re starting to see a slight increase in deaths around the world, and that’s to be expected if we want to see increasing cases. But it is also a worrying sign. ‘
WKO’s emergency chief, dr. Michael Ryan, has acknowledged an urge among the public in many places to get out of pandemic restrictions. Ryan insisted that any relaxation should coincide with measures such as strict case monitoring and high vaccination levels, but said vaccines alone would not be enough.
‘I’m afraid we’re all trying to grab straws. “We are trying to find the golden solution: ‘So we’re just getting enough vaccine and we’re pushing enough vaccine on people, and that’s going to take care of that,’ ‘he said. “I’m sorry, it’s not.”