Europe is the only region with more Covid: WHO

Says cases showed an 11 per cent rise; however, cases and deaths globally have also risen about 6 per cent

The World Health Organization said that coronavirus cases jumped by 11 per cent in Europe in the last week, the only region in the world where Covid-19 has continued to increase since mid-October.

In its weekly assessment of the pandemic released on Tuesday, the UN health agency said cases and deaths globally have risen by about 6 per cent, with about 3.6 million new infections and 51,00 new deaths reported in the previous week.

WHO’s Europe director Dr Hans Kluge warned that without urgent measures taken soon, the continent could see another 700,000 deaths by the spring.

“The European region remains in the firm grip of the Covid-19 pandemic,” Kluge said, calling for countries to increase vaccination and to take other control measures like masking and social distancing to avoid “the last resort of lockdowns.”

He noted that while more than 1 billion vaccine doses have been administered across WHO’s European region, which stretches to central Asia, the range in vaccination coverage varies from 10 per cent to 80 per cent.

In the last week, Austria, the Netherlands and Belgium have all adopted stricter measures including partial lockdowns to try to stem the latest surge of the coronavirus. Germany is also set to record more than 100,000 Covid-19 deaths this week, with some politicians now calling for a vaccine mandate, like the one ordered in Austria.

Globally, WHO reported that Covid-19 in Southeast Asia and the Middle East dropped by 11 per cent and 9 per cent respectively. The biggest decrease in coronavirus deaths in the last week was seen in Africa, where fatalities fell by 30 per cent, continuing a decreasing trend in Covid-19 that first began in late June.

Pak government admits negligence

Pakistan Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin on Tuesday admitted that the Imran Khan government was negligent in handling the Covid-19 situation in the country as the administration didn’t import enough gas cargoes on time. Tarin said that, in order to handle the gas crisis, Pakistan had to purchase gas despite the higher prices. As reported by The News International, Tarin admitted the government should have purchased gas cargoes on time adding that the country’s imports of petroleum and gas touched almost $ 20 billion per year during high demand. In September, the Islamic country faced a surge in medical oxygen demand in the fourth wave of the pandemic, local media reported. In a letter to hospitals, Pakistan Oxygen Limited - the country’s oxygen-producing company - had expressed its inability to meet the rising demand.

Putin tests nasal vaccine

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday he has taken an experimental nasal vaccine against the coronavirus, three days after he received his booster shot, as Russia faces its worst surge of infections and deaths since the pandemic began.

4,36,031
No. of new cases reported globally in the past 24 hours

25,74,69,528
Total no. of cases worldwide

51,58,211
Total no. of deaths worldwide

Source: WHO/Johns Hopkins

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