#16,623
The summary from this week's epidemiological update follows:
Data as of 6 March 2022
Globally, during the week of 28 February through 6 March 2022, the number of new COVID-19 cases and deaths continued to decline by 5% and 8% respectively, as compared to the previous week (Figure 1). Across the six WHO regions, over 10 million new cases and over 52 000 new deaths were reported (Table 1). As of 6 March 2022, over 433 million confirmed cases and over 5.9 million deaths have been reported globally.
At the regional level, while the Western Pacific Region continued to report an increase (+46%) in the number of new weekly cases, all other regions reported decreases: the Eastern Mediterranean Region (-46%), the African Region (-40%), the South-East Asia Region (-31%), the Region of the Americas (-24%), and the European Region (-18%). The number of new weekly deaths increased in the Western Pacific Region (+29%) and remained stable in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (+2%), while decreases were reported by the African Region (-39%), the European Region (-15%), the Region of the Americas (-9%) and the South-East Asia Region (-3%). These trends should be interpreted with caution as several countries are progressively adopting targeted testing strategies, resulting in lower overall numbers of tests performed and consequently of cases detected.
The highest numbers of new cases were reported from the Republic of Korea (1 461 431 new cases; +42%), Germany (1 108 231 new cases; -1%), Viet Nam (1 013 343 new cases; +112%), the Russian Federation (650 540 new cases; -29%), and Japan (452 763 new cases; +4%).
The highest number of new deaths were reported from the United States of America (10 579 new deaths; -9%), Russian Federation (5354 new deaths; -1%), Brazil (3865 new deaths; -11%), Indonesia (2099 new deaths, +23%), and Japan (1519 new deaths; -7%).
Whether this retreat is the pandemic's last hurrah, or simply a temporary retreat, is unknown at this time. The emergence of yet another VOC (Variant of Concern) could change this trajectory overnight.
This week's report also contains an update on the Omicron variant, along with updates on vaccine effectiveness for the Delta and Omicron variants. The WHO also addresses recent reports of recombinant variants (see A COVID Recombination Review).But for now, a pandemic weary world will welcome it. At least, outside of the Western Pacific region (South Korea, Hong Kong and potentially Mainland China).
The current global epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 is characterized by the global dominance of the Omicron variant. Delta remains the only other named variant with significant reported circulation. Among the 428 417 sequences uploaded to GISAID with specimen collection date in the last 30 days, i 427 152 (99.7%) were Omicron and 580 (0.1%) were Delta. For all countries/areas/territories with 100 or more sequences uploaded to GISAID within the last 30 days, Omicron remains the dominant variant.Among Omicron descendent lineages reported within the last 30 days i , BA.1.1 is the predominant sub-variant, accounting for 187 058 sequences (41%); BA.2 accounts for 156 014 sequences (34.2%); BA.1 accounts for 112 655 sequences (24.7%); and BA.3 accounts for 101 sequences (<1%). ii To note, global VOCs distribution should be interpreted with due consideration of surveillance limitations, including differences in sequencing capacities and sampling strategies between countries, as well as delays in reporting.Both the Technical Advisory Group on SARS-CoV-2 Virus Evolution (TAG-VE) and WHO are aware of reports on recombinant variants, both recombinants of Delta and Omicron, as well as recombinants of BA.1 and BA.2.Recombination is a natural phenomenon and can be regarded as an expected mutational event. The same monitoring and assessment process is applied to these recombinants, after verification and exclusion of potential contamination or co-infection, as for any other emerging variant. Current epidemiological and sequencing information for these recombinants do not indicate any sign of rapid transmission or a change in clinical severity. Only a few clusters have been reported to date and show very low to almost undetectable levels of transmission to contacts. No recombinant variant has been given a Pango lineage name.
The Omicron variant
Differences in the characteristics of VOCs
Available evidence on the phenotypic impacts of VOCs is reported in previous editions of the COVID-19 Weekly Epidemiological Update. Since the last update on 15 February 2022, there have been several new publications on the phenotypic characteristics of VOCs, including literature on Omicron (Table 2). Some of these studies have not been peer-reviewed and the findings must therefore be interpreted with due consideration of this limitation.
