14.07.2021 – 21:33
The whole world is in the early stages of a new wave of coronavirus pandemic. So said the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tantros Antanom Gebregesus.
“We are currently in the early stages of the third wave,” he told a Covid-19 emergency committee meeting at the WHO in Geneva.
The WHO Director-General drew attention to the rising morbidity recorded worldwide last week, as well as mortality from the effects of the coronavirus. In fact, the death toll rose for the first time after their steady decline in the previous 10 weeks.
“The Delta variant is one of the main factors in the current increase in transmissibility indicators, which is fueled by increased social contacts and mobility, as well as non-compliance in the implementation of proven measures in the field of medical care and social measures,” he said.
He further added that “the Delta variant is currently present in more than 111 countries and because of this the WHO expects it to soon become the dominant executive, which will circulate in the world, if it has not already been done.”
The WHO Director-General described the inequality in access to vaccines as shocking. A large part of the world’s population is completely dependent on the coronavirus due to this lack of access, he said, noting that many countries have not yet received any vaccine while most countries have not received enough vaccines.
Although the international COVAX mechanism may work, Gebregesus said, the scale of its activity is still very small, as just over 100 million doses have been distributed through this mechanism so far.
