Pandemic spirals, but deaths drop

PARIS: The number of Covid-19 cases spiralled by more than a half across the world this week, while pandemic-linked deaths dropped nine per cent.

Here is the global state of play from an AFP database:

1.1 million daily cases: The average number of new daily coronavirus cases passed the symbolic one million mark to 1.18 million, a 57 per cent increase over the week before.

The Europe region accounted for 54 per cent of the cases, recording 4,490,612 over the week. The United States and Canada zone provided another 32 per cent, with 2,636,831 cases.

The confirmed cases only reflect a fraction of the actual number of infections, with varying counting practices and levels of testing in different countries.

Flare ups in Latin America, Oceania: The main flare ups at a regional level took place in Oceania and Latin America and the Caribbean, where they more than doubled — by 157 per cent and 138 per cent respectively.

There was also a big increase of 92 per cent in cases in the United States/Canada zone. The number of infections increased in Europe by 47 per cent and in the Middle East by 37 per cent. Cases in Africa, where the highly contagious Omicron variant was first detected, increased by just eight per cent.

Asia bucked the world trend with its infection numbers down two per cent.

Record cases: Some 30 countries from all corners of the world struck record weekly infection rates.

They include the countries with the highest number of infections per person, led by Denmark with 1,907 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, Ireland (1,784), Cyprus (1,497), the United Kingdom (1,441), and France (1,260).

Deaths down: At a global level the number of Covid-linked deaths dropped nine per cent to 6,330 on average per day.

Europe accounted for more than half, or 53 per cent of the deaths, with 23,324 people succumbing over the past week. The United States and Canada made up 24 per cent, or 10,433, of the fatalities.

The countries reporting the highest death rates in proportion to their population were Trinidad and Tobago with 12.08 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, Georgia (11.76), Hungary (8.25), Poland (7.85), and Croatia (7.65). — AFP