2023-05-05 16:41:06
Covid 19 is now sufficiently under control to lift the maximum level of alert, the WHO announced on Friday May 5, after more than three years of a pandemic.
“It is with great hope that I declare that Covid-19 is no longer a health emergency of international concern”said the director general of the WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, believing that this disease had “at least 20 million” of dead.
► Maximum alert in January 2020
The experts consulted by the Director General judged that“it was time to move on to long-term management of the Covid-19 pandemic” despite the uncertainties that remain on the evolution of the virus.
The organization’s highest level of alert was declared on January 30, 2020, just a few weeks after the detection in China of the first cases of this new viral respiratory disease against which there was then no specific treatment.
► Pandemic in March 2020
But it was not until the head of the WHO spoke of a pandemic in March 2020 that States and populations became aware of the seriousness of the situation and that sometimes very restrictive health measures – up to long months of confinement – are put in place.
Sars CoV-2 was already well underway on its deadly journey which would see it emerge very quickly around the world. The fight against the pandemic was invented gradually, often out of order, as illustrated by the chaotic management of Donald Trump’s presidency, often deaf to scientific recommendations.
► 16,000 dead in April
While the number of newly recorded Covid deaths has dropped by 95% since January, there were still 16,000 who died of this disease between the end of March and the end of April because of the virus, according to WHO statistics. Yet in many countries the pandemic has faded into the background. Tests and health monitoring are reduced to the minimum portion. A disarmament deemed premature by the WHO.
The crisis phase “has passed but not the Covid”thus warned Friday Maria Van Kerkhove, who managed the fight against Covid-19 within this organization, calling not to ” Lower the guards “.
► Covid longs
In many countries, the pandemic now seems like background noise, new variants continue to appear and threaten to restart the infernal machine. “The virus continues to mutate and it is still capable of causing new waves of contamination and death”recently underlined the boss of the WHO.
He also drew attention to the ravages of the long Covid, which results in a wide range of more or less disabling symptoms. According to him, one infection in 10 translates into a long Covid, suggesting that hundreds of millions of people could need long-term care and whose magnitude and economic and psychological cost are still very poorly taken into account.
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