Several European countries, including Germany, France, Italy and the United Kingdom, raised too much “brutally” their measures to curb the Covid-19 epidemic. Today, they find themselves faced with a sharp rise in cases under the effect of the Omicron sub-variant (BA2), lamented Tuesday March 22 the World Health Organization (WHO).
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During a press conference relocated to Moldova, the director of the WHO in Europe, Hans Kluge, said to himself « vigilant » on the current epidemic situation on the continent, while affirming to remain “optimistic”.
Rebound in Western Europe
Currently, the number of Covid cases is on the rise again in 18 of the 53 countries in the WHO Europe zone, according to the health organization. “The countries where we see a particular increase are the United Kingdom, Ireland, Greece, Cyprus, France, Italy and Germany”underlined Hans Kluge. “These countries have lifted restrictions abruptly from ‘too much’ to ‘not enough'”, said the UN official. According to WHO data, the number of new cases in Europe had fallen sharply after peaking in late January, but it has been rebounding since early March.
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Almost all health restrictions were lifted in France on Monday March 14. Since that date, the vaccination pass is no longer required to go to restaurants, museums or discotheques. Wearing a mask is no longer compulsory in the workplace and school protocols have been lightened. Recently, the government shortened the duration of isolation for unvaccinated people, aligning it with that of those who received their booster dose.
Over the past seven days, more than 5.1 million new cases and 12,496 deaths have been recorded in the WHO Europe area, bringing the total number of cases detected since the start of the pandemic to nearly 194.4 million and the number of deaths to more than 1.92 million.