Cases, deaths drop globally

The number of new cases of Covid-19 reported worldwide fell by 16 percent last week to 2.7 million, the World Health Organization said.

The number of new deaths reported also fell 10 percent week-on-week, to 81,000, the WHO said late Tuesday in its weekly epidemiological update, using figures up to Sunday.

Five of the six WHO regions of the world reported a double-digit percentage decline in new cases, with only the Eastern Mediterranean showing a rise, of seven percent.

New case numbers dropped 20 percent last week in Africa and in the Western Pacific, 18 percent in Europe, 16 percent in the Americas and 13 percent in southeast Asia.

WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday that the number of new cases had declined for a fifth consecutive week, dropping by almost half, from more than five million cases in the week of January 4.

"This shows that simple public health measures work, even in the presence of variants," Tedros said.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres yesterday called for a global plan to vaccinate against Covid-19, warning that inequities in initial efforts risked both the world's health and economy.

Meanwhile the Covax facility, the global Covid-19 vaccine procurement and distribution effort which aims to ensure poorer countries are also able to access doses, said its final shipment list for the first deliveries would be issued next week, following the WHO giving the green light to the AstraZeneca jabs.

Meanwhile, the EU yesterday said it will launch a programme to study Covid-19 variants and produce "second generation" vaccines against future strains, the bloc's president has said.

The "HERA incubator" programme, which began yesterday, will bring together the pharmaceutical industry, laboratories, health authorities and researchers, Ursula von der Leyen said.

Japan, meanwhile, launched its vaccination programme yesterday, five months ahead of the Tokyo Olympics, as Australia and New Zealand ended snap lockdowns after they successfully brought small outbreaks under control in just days.

With infections topping 109 million and more than 2.4 million deaths, the pandemic has devastated the global economy, and populations are growing increasingly frustrated with financially painful restrictions that authorities and experts say are necessary to fight the virus.

South Africa launched its vaccination programme using a Johnson & Johnson vaccine, after a delayed start caused by concerns about the ability of the Oxford-AstraZeneca formula to shield against a widespread variant of the virus.

 Gaza received its first shipment of Covid-19 vaccines yesterday after Israel approved the transfer through its border with the Hamas Islamist-run territory, Israeli and Palestinian officials said.