After a 5-week drop, global COVID-19 cases stabilized last week, though deaths continued to decline, the World Health Organization (WHO) said today in its weekly update on the pandemic.Cases were down in all but one of the six world regions, with the biggest drop in African countries (-35%).
Cases were up 3% in the Western Pacific and down only 1% in Europe.Of more than 3.2 million new cases reported last week, the five countries reporting the most were Japan, the United States, South Korea, Russia, and China.
In the previous week, officials reported 3.1 million new COVID cases.Meanwhile, deaths declined 17% from the previous week, with countries reporting more than 9,800 fatalities to the WHO.The WHO has urged caution in interpreting COVID patterns, given decreases in testing and fewer SARS-CoV-2 sequences submitted for analysis.Diversifying Omicron subvariantsIn its latest update on variants, the WHO said the Omicron variant continues to dominate and become more diversified.
There are now more than 230 Omicron descendants and more than 30 recombinants. During the final days of August and into September, the BA.5 subvariant made up 76.6% of sequences, with BA.4 accounting for 7.5%.The WHO is closely tracking six Omicron subvariant lineages, with proportions of BA.2.75—with its nine extra spike mutations—low but rising.