Since the end of March, the number of new Covid cases and deaths have been declining, the WHO has said in its latest epidemiological update. Some parts of SouthEast Asia and Africa have been witnessing a fresh spike, it underlines. In the two years of pandemic, more than 500 million confirmed cases and over six million Covid deaths have been registered. With the drop in cases bringing a slight relief, focus still remains on Germany, Italy and France and China where Shanghai and Beijing have been struggling to balance Covid surge and curbs.
Here are the latest global updates on Covid:
1. “During the week of (April) 18 through April 24, over 4.5 million cases and over 15 000 deaths were reported, decreases of 21 per cent and 20 per cent respectively, as compared to the previous week,” the WHO’s latest update read.
2. A surge, however, in the new weekly cases was reported from “the regions of the Americas (+9 per cent) and the African Region (+32 per cent), and the number of new weekly deaths increased in the South-East Asia Region (+41 per cent), due to a delay in reporting of deaths from India, and in the Africa Region (+110 per cent),” the report further highlighted.
3. In a big relief for Shanghai’s 12-million plus population, locals can now leave homes as curbs were eased, news agency Reuters reported. China’s financial hub also emerged as the Covid epicenter in the last few weeks as it battled the worst-ever outbreak amid the pandemic. “The number of people in the sealed and controlled zones has clearly fallen,” Zhao Dandan, deputy director of Shanghai’s health commission, told a media briefing.
4. Meanwhile, according to another Reuters report, Chinese capital Beijing closed more gyms, malls, cinemas and apartment blocks on Friday, with authorities ramping up contact tracing.
5. Germany, Italy and France are yet to see a remarkable drop in Covid cases. France had reported more than 70,000 new cases on Wednesday. The next day, it had over 67,000 confirmed cases, according to the WHO data.
6. In Germany, between 3 January 2020 and 28 April 2022, there have been 24,609,159 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 135,078 deaths, says the world health body. In the week between April 18-April 25, over 3.6 lakh confirmed Covid cases were recorded, according to the WHO tally.
7. In Italy, another European country that has faced a surge, the WHO said that over 88,000 confirmed cases were registered by Thursday. In the April 18-25 week, over 2 lakh Covid cases were reported.
8. Face masks will continue to be mandatory in public transport of the country, the health minister was quoted as saying in reports.
9. Taiwan reported that the daily number of confirmed domestic COVID-19 cases had topped 10,000 for the first time, in line with predictions, and the health minister said infections would continue to rise.
10. Africa is seeing a spike, driven by doubling of cases in South Africa.