The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that the pandemic is “at a critical point”, stressing that last week saw the fourth highest number of cumulative cases since the pandemic began. In this regard, it calls for a “concerted effort” of containment measures.
“Between January and February, we saw a decline in the number of Covid-19 cases worldwide,” WHO Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus began at a press conference on Monday. However, he warned that for “seven consecutive weeks there has been an increase in cases” and for “four weeks there has been an increase in deaths”.
In this sense, the WHO warns that the pandemic is growing to a “critical point”, stressing that last week was the fourth week with the highest number of infections by the new coronavirus as a result of the “large increase in the number of cases” detected in several countries in Asia and the Middle East.
Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical leader, also highlighted that “the pandemic’s trajectory is growing exponentially”, highlighting that last week there was a 90% increase in the transmission of infections.
In this sense, the officials recall that the pandemic is “far from over”, but that the decline in new cases and deaths recorded in the first two months of this year show that “this virus and its variants can be stopped”, through “equitable vaccination” and with a “concerted effort” of containment measures between countries, which include physical distance, use of masks, ventilation of spaces, testing, screening, isolation and hand hygiene.
Finally, the director general of health pointed out that the transmission of the virus is being driven by “confusion, complacency and inconsistency in public health measures”, and therefore advocated for a “coherent” approach to measures. “The choice is ours,” he concluded.