COVID-19 pandemic is nowhere near over: WHO

Kathmandu: World Health Organization has warned that COVID-19 remains a ‘Public Health Emergency of International Concern.’ WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, fresh waves of COVID-19 cases show that the pandemic is nowhere near over. He said, cases of COVID continue to rise, putting further pressure on stretched health systems and health workers, and deaths are unacceptably high.

WHO chief urged governments to regularly review and adjust their COVID response plans based on the current epidemiology and also the potential for new variants to appear. Sub-variants of Omicron, like BA.4 and BA.5, continue to drive waves of cases, hospitalization, and death around the world, he added.

The Emergency Committee on COVID-19 met on Friday and concluded that the virus remains a public health emergency of international concern.

The number of Covid cases reported to the WHO increased 30 percent in the past two weeks, driven by sub-variants of the Omicron strain and the lifting of control measures.