The omicron variant of coronavirus, from which 60% of Europeans might be infected before March, gave way to a new phase of the covid pandemic in the region and might precipitate its end, the Director of the World Health Organization for Europe, Hans Kluge.
“It is plausible that the region is approaching the end of the pandemic,” Hans Kluge told AFP, although he called for caution, given the versatility of the virus. “Once the omicron wave has subsided, there will be a few weeks and months of global immunity, either through the vaccine or because people will be immune due to infection and also a decline due to seasonality,” he said.
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However, we are not in “an endemic era,” the UN official stressed. “Endemic means (…) that we can predict what is going to happen, this virus has surprised us more than once so we have to be very careful,” insisted Mr. Kluge.
In the region of 53 countries, some of which are in Central Asia, omicron accounted for 15% of new covid cases as of January 18, more than half from the previous week, according to WHO data. In the European Union and the European Economic Area (EEA), this variant, which appeared in late November and is more contagious than the Delta, is now the dominant one, according to the European health agency. With infections exploding, the focus is now on “minimizing
