The WHO insists that China does not provide full data on its deaths from COVID-19.

The Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, assured this Wednesday that China does not provide complete data on deaths from COVID-19 during the current outbreak, which prevents us from knowing the true extent of the disease. globally.

“Last week, 11,500 deaths from COVID-19 (…), but this number is almost certainly an underestimate, given the lack of data on deaths associated with COVID-19 in ChinaTedros said at his weekly press conference.

According to statistics WHO, China reported in the first week of January 252,000 infections COVID-19 and about 700 deaths.

Chapter WHO He stated that “globally we are without a doubt in a better position than a year ago” when omicron wave infections peaked and since then the death rate recorded worldwide has decreased by 90%, but in a few months it caused them some stagnation.

“Since mid-September, the number of reported weekly deaths has been between 10,000 and 14,000 — a figure that the world cannot accept when we have the tools to avoid them,” Tedros said.

The Ethiopian expert also expressed regret that only fifty countries provide complete information on the sex and age of those who died from COVID-19something important to monitor the lethality of the virus.

In the second half of 2022, he stressed, 90% of the registered deaths were people over 65 years old.

Genome sequencing is falling

Tedros also warned that genome sequencing of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus has dropped by 90% over the past year, making it difficult to track possible variants that may arise.

“It is clear that countries cannot maintain the same level of testing and sequencing that was during the peak of the micron variant, but on the other hand, the world cannot close its eyes and hope that the virus will disappear,” the CEO said.

“Sequencing continues to be vital in detecting the virus and measuring the emergence and spread of new variants such as XBB 1.5,” he said, citing the sublineage first discovered in the northeastern United States and that sequencing itself WHO recognized as the most contagious of all known to date.

(As reported by EFE)

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