London: The World Health Organization said that coronavirus cases have tripled across Europe in the past six weeks, accounting for nearly half of all infections globally. Hospitalisation rates have also doubled over, even though intensive care admissions have remained low.
In a statement, Dr Hans Kluge, WHO’s Europe director, described Covid as “a nasty and potentially deadly illness” that people should not underestimate. He said super-infectious relatives of the omicron variant were driving new waves of disease across the continent and that repeat infections could potentially lead to long Covid. Further he added, worldwide, Covid cases have spiked up for the past five weeks, even as countries have reduced the number of testing. “With rising cases, we’re also seeing a rise in hospitalisations, which are only set to increase further in the autumn and winter months”.
A senior WHO official said, in the meantime, European nations must speed up vaccine uptake and bring back mask wearing to tackle the surge in Covid cases. They also have to bring back stricter steps which eased earlier.
