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By Chioma Obinna

 The latest global report of the  World Health Organisation, WHO has shown that the African region recorded a 31 per cent increase in the number of new weekly cases of COVID-19 in the last week.

The report also revealed that globally, the number of new COVID-19 cases and deaths has continued to decline since the end of March 2022.

According to the report, during the week of 25 April through 1 May 2022, over 3.8 million cases and over 15 000 deaths were reported.

The week also showed decreases of 17 percent and 3 percent respectively, as compared to the previous week.

The report says:  “However, an increase in the number of new weekly cases was reported from the African Region (+31percent) and the Region of the Americas (+13 percent).

It also showed that  the number of new weekly deaths increased in the South-East Asia Region (+69 per cent) largely due to a delay in the reporting of deaths from India

“As of 1 May 2022, over 500 million confirmed cases and over six million deaths have been reported globally.”

WHO also provided updates on circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOCs) in the current edition.