The World Health Organization expressed concern on Thursday about the rate of transmission of the Covid-19 virus currently “very worrying” in the 53 countries of the European region. “If we stay on this trajectory, we could see another half a million deaths from Covid-19 in the region by February,” lamented WHO Europe director Hans Kluge at a conference online press release. “We are, again, at the epicenter,” he said.
For the WHO, the increase in cases is explained by the combination of insufficient vaccination coverage and the relaxation of anti-Covid measures. According to its data from WHO Europe, hospitalizations linked to Covid “have more than doubled in one week”.
Put on masks to save 188,000 lives
The number of new cases per day has been on the rise for almost six consecutive weeks in Europe and the number of new deaths per day has been on the rise for just over seven consecutive weeks, with around 250,000 cases and 3,600 daily deaths. The current increase is notably driven by Russia (8,162 deaths in the last seven days), Ukraine (3,819 deaths) and Romania (3,100 deaths), according to these data.
The organization called for continued massive use of masks in the face of the pandemic. “Reliable projections show that if we achieve a 95% use rate of masks in Europe and Central Asia, we could save up to 188,000 lives out of the half a million lives we risk losing here.” February 2022 ”, noted Hans Kluge.