At the opening of the 75th World Health Assembly this week, the WHO director-general warned that we have not reached the end of the pandemic and more must be done to support countries with low vaccination rates – “Only 57 countries have vaccinated 70% of their population – almost all of them high-income countries.” Read more
In last week’s WHO epi update, four regions recorded increased COVID-19 case numbers, with the reminder that this was against a backdrop of ‘lower overall numbers of tests performed and consequently lower numbers of cases detected’ in many nations. Of the regions, countries with high case numbers were Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Iran in the Eastern Mediterranean and China, Australia and Japan in the Western Pacific. The PAHO briefing of May 18 noted a 27 percent increase in the Americas (the BA.2.12.1 variant is now dominant in the USA), while in Africa an upward trend in cases was seen in South Africa, Eswatini and Namibia. Global weekly death rates fell for the sixth consecutive week. Read more
Related news, articles:
- The WHO has validated the 11th COVID-19 vaccine, a single dose Chinese-developed vaccine based on a modified human adenovirus.
- An article published in The Conversation on May 19 advocated public health measures for managing waves of transmission in Australia: ‘Reducing COVID transmission by 20% could save 2,000 Australian lives this year’.
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