Only one month after the US lifted the mask order, Philadelphia will usher in a mandatory mask order again.
Beginning April 18, local time, more than 1.6 million Philadelphia residents must wear masks again when entering indoor public places. Philadelphia became the first major U.S. city to impose a mask mandate as cases rose again.
On April 13, the World Health Organization (WHO) New Crown Pandemic Emergency Committee held a meeting. After discussion, it was determined that the new crown pandemic continued to constitute a “public health emergency of international concern”, and countries were advised to prepare for it at any time. Do a good job in vaccination and PCR swab testing.
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WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said: “It’s far from the time to let our guard down.”
According to the latest data from Johns Hopkins University in the United States. The number of confirmed cases of new coronary pneumonia in the world has exceeded 500 million. And the number of deaths has exceeded 6.1 million.
Endorsed by the WHO, in other words, one in 16 people in the world will carry the covid virus.
Since December last year, Omicron has been rampant around the world, with more than 200 million new confirmed cases worldwide in 2022.
500 million, or 5 billion?
At the same time, many experts and even the WHO believe that the number of truly infected people in the world is far more than 500 million, and may even exceed 5 billion.
Not to mention India, Africa and other countries and regions with poor medical conditions, weak testing capabilities, and chaotic management, even in the United States, the CDC has previously acknowledged that the number of infections reported nationwide is estimated to be less than 1/4 of the actual number of infections.
So, can the covid-19 stop this year?
COVID-19: Will The Pandemic End in 2022?
Faced with this question, WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic did not respond positively, but reiterated that in order to end the acute phase of the new crown pandemic, scientists have developed an effective epidemic prevention and control response.
Viral Transport Medium With Swab
He also warned: “As the new crown epidemic continues to spread on a large scale around the world, the emergence of more new crown variants and recombinant variants is foreseeable.”
Tedros said that the WHO is currently closely monitoring the development of BA.2, BA.4, BA.5 and other Omicron subtype strains, as well as the recombinant XE formed by the combination of BA.1 and BA.2 evolution.
BA series and X series, how dangerous?
Although the number of new cases around the world has been declining for three consecutive weeks. There are also some countries and regions where new cases are still climbing.
Many Asian countries are experiencing the Omicron wave for the first time. In South Korea, new infections and deaths have continued to climb since February. The country now has the world’s highest daily average of new confirmed cases for a week. According to a Reuters analysis, South Korea currently has an average of more than 182,000 new confirmed cases per day, accounting for a quarter of the world’s newly confirmed cases.
Some European and American countries have experienced a wave of Omicron infection peaks at the beginning of this year, but the epidemic has recently rebounded.
In Europe, the daily increase of confirmed cases in France has shown a slow upward trend, and the seven-day average of newly confirmed cases in Germany has declined, but it is still at a high level. Reuters pointed out that the number of new cases in Europe is still huge, with more than 1 million new confirmed cases almost every two days.
At present, BA.2 is the main circulating strain in many countries, accounting for 94% of all gene sequencing.
While BA.4 and BA.5: Found in South Africa and many European countries.
Experts believe that if more people can be vaccinated and more people have the tools to fight the epidemic, then we can reduce severe cases and further reduce infections, thereby gradually ending the pandemic.
He also emphasized that it is very important to continue swab testing while the pandemic is still ongoing so that cases can be accurately tracked.
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