TAMPA, Fla. — The latest situation report from the World Health Organization shows a slight increase in COVID-19 cases, even as global deaths hit their lowest weekly number since October.
What You Need To Know
- WHO report shows 2.6 million new COVID cases reported from June 28-July 4
- Americas the only region that did not see cases rise
- USF researcher says Delta variant likely to blame for slight increase
- Global deaths hit lowest weekly number since Oct.
“The numbers are sort of telling me, especially the numbers coming out of the U.K. and some of the recent reports that are coming out of Israel, is that this new variant that we have is circulating around, this Delta variant, seems to be giving us some breakthroughs in infection among vaccinated people, particularly people who have only had one dose of the vaccine,” said Dr. Thomas Unnasch, co-director of the University of South Florida’s Center for Global Health and Infectious Disease Research.
According to the WHO’s “COVID-19 Weekly Epidemiological Update,” more than 2.6 million cases were reported from June 28-July 4.
The report states it’s the second week to see a slight increase in cases following seven weeks of decline.
Europe saw a sharp increase in infections as new cases rose 30%. Africa saw a 23% jump in deaths. The Americas were the only region that didn’t see cases go up, but Unnasch said that doesn’t mean it’s a situation that won’t impact the U.S.
“We want to really worry about additional variants that are going to start up here that may have even higher levels of infection or, even worse, escape variants that are able to get around the immune response that’s been elicited by the current vaccine,” he said.
Unnasch said the latest numbers also offer some positive news. They show fewer than 54,000 people died from COVID during the week. Not only is that a 7% decrease from the week before, it’s also the lowest weekly figure for global deaths since last fall.
“It seems like the cases are less serious,” he said. “I think that may be due to two reasons, one of which is that we’re starting to infect younger people now who are healthier and have less risk for severe infections and death as a result of infection. The other, I think, is that people who have even had a single dose of the vaccine are still substantially protected against the really bad outcomes, really severe hospitalization and death.”
The countries that reported the highest number of new cases during the week were Brazil, India, and Colombia.
