84 million confirmed cases worldwide last month alone
In Denmark, it is estimated that 1 in 5 people are infected.
WSJ “Compared to the Spanish Flu of 1918”
Analysis of the novel coronavirus infection (COVID-19) omicron mutation is the disease that caused the most number of patients in the shortest time in the past 100 years.
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on the 5th (local time) that the Omicron mutation is the disease with the highest number of cases in a short period of time since the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918-1919. According to the WSJ, health care experts analyzed that the number of COVID-19 cases around the world in the last 5 or 6 weeks, when omicron mutations were rampant, greatly outweighs the number of cases caused by other diseases that have appeared in the last 100 years during the same period. William Schaffner, a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University in the United States, said, “The only case that can be compared with the scale and speed of the spread of Omicron is the 1918 flu pandemic.”
It is estimated that 1 in 6 people in the UK and 1 in 5 in Denmark have contracted COVID-19 since the end of November last year, when the omicron mutation was discovered. According to the international statistical site Our World in Data, 84 million people around the world were diagnosed with COVID-19 last month alone. If asymptomatic infections are included, the actual number of confirmed cases is likely to be higher.
The Institute for Health Metrics and Analysis (IHME) at the University of Washington Medical School estimates that 80 to 90% of those infected with the Omicron mutation will be asymptomatic.
Reporter Kim Seong-mo mo@donga.com
