COVID-19 deaths have dropped by 95%, but virus is here to stay: WHO

The World Health Organization said on Wednesday that COVID-19 deaths had dropped by 95 per cent since the start of the year. "We're very encouraged by the sustained decline in reported deaths from COVID-19, which have dropped 95 per cent since the beginning of this year," WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a press conference.

However, the WHO warned that the virus was still on the move and people will have to learn to live with it. It added that COVID-19 was here to stay and countries need to learn how to manage its ongoing non-emergency effects. This includes managing post-COVID-19 conditions, or Long Covid.

"However, some countries are seeing increases, and over the past four weeks, 14,000 people lost their lives to this disease. And, with the emergence of the new XBB.1.16 variant illustrates, the virus is still changing, and is still capable of causing new waves of disease and death."

Talking about the dominant variant across the world at this time, Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO's technical lead on Covid, said that XBB sub-lineages were now dominant worldwide.

The variant has increased transmissibility and is also showing an immune escape mechanism, thus reinfecting people despite being vaccinated or previously infected.

She said that increased testing is needed "so that we can monitor the virus itself and understand what each of these mutations means". That knowledge could feed into vaccine composition and inform decisions on handling the virus, she said.

Tedros once again said that the WHO was hopeful of declaring an end to COVID-19 as a public health emergency of international concern soon. The committee that advises him on the status of the virus is due to convene next month for its regular quarterly meeting.

"But this virus is here to stay, and all countries will need to learn to manage it alongside other infectious diseases," he added.

Tedros also spoke of Long Covid and said that an estimated one in 10 infections resulted in the prolonged effects of the virus, suggesting that hundreds of millions of people would need longer-term care.

The WHO chief also noted how the pandemic disrupted vaccination programmes, with an estimated 67 million children missing out on at least one essential jab between 2019 and 2021.

(With inputs from agencies)

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