WHO: COVID Continues to Decline, Except in Americas, Africa

A health worker waits for people to be tested for Covid-19 coronavirus at a makeshift testing site outside a museum along a street in Beijing on May 4, 2022. (AFP)
A health worker waits for people to be tested for Covid-19 coronavirus at a makeshift testing site outside a museum along a street in Beijing on May 4, 2022. (AFP)
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WHO: COVID Continues to Decline, Except in Americas, Africa

A health worker waits for people to be tested for Covid-19 coronavirus at a makeshift testing site outside a museum along a street in Beijing on May 4, 2022. (AFP)
A health worker waits for people to be tested for Covid-19 coronavirus at a makeshift testing site outside a museum along a street in Beijing on May 4, 2022. (AFP)

The World Health Organization said Wednesday that the number of newly reported coronavirus cases and deaths globally continued to fall in the last week, continuing a decline that first began in March.

In its weekly report on the pandemic, the UN health agency said there were about 3.8 million new infections and more than 15,000 deaths last week, a 17% and 3% drop on the week respectively. But those figures are believed to be a significant underestimate of COVID-19’s true toll as increasing numbers of countries abandon widespread testing and surveillance.

Still, the WHO noted that cases rose by about a third in Africa and 13% in the Americas. There was also a nearly 70% jump in deaths reported in India, although that was attributed to delayed reporting rather than a recent surge of disease.

Last week, authorities in South Africa said they had noted an uptick in COVID-19 cases attributable to the BA.4 mutant of omicron, although they said it was too early to tell if that would result in a significant new wave of disease. Although the BA.4 version of COVID-19's omicron variant appears more infectious than omicron, the WHO said there was no evidence yet that it was leading to substantially higher rates of hospitalization or death.

Salim Abdool Karim, a public health expert at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, said that while only a "modest" rise in cases had been noted, South Africa was also in the middle of a holiday period and testing had dropped significantly. He said the cases were slowing and were "not following a rocket-like upward trajectory we would expect" in another spike of disease.

At a press briefing on Wednesday, WHO emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan said it was soon to tell if COVID-19 was entering a seasonal pattern and warned against countries dropping all of their restrictions too quickly - as many in the West have done.

"The jury is still out as to how seasonal this virus will become," he said, explaining that it wasn’t proven yet that COVID-19 would naturally drop off in the summer and that the world could yet face more unsettling variants. "If people are crowded together in conditions where a new variant is spreading, you will see high levels of transmission," he said.

Meanwhile in China, authorities continued to crack down on cities including Beijing, where more than 10% of the subway system was shut down in an effort to curb the virus' spread, after authorities in the capital already closed down indoor dining, gyms and school classes.

In Shanghai, rigid and widely derided restrictions have led to shortages of food and medical aid along with a wider - though likely temporary - impact on the national economy. Desperate, outraged citizens have confronted authorities at barricades and online, screamed out of their windows and banged pots and pans in a sign of frustration and anger.



Dutch Tighten Controls on Military and Dual Use Exports to Israel

Containers in the Port of Rotterdam are seen in Rotterdam, Netherlands, November 1, 2022. REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw/File Photo
Containers in the Port of Rotterdam are seen in Rotterdam, Netherlands, November 1, 2022. REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw/File Photo
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Dutch Tighten Controls on Military and Dual Use Exports to Israel

Containers in the Port of Rotterdam are seen in Rotterdam, Netherlands, November 1, 2022. REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw/File Photo
Containers in the Port of Rotterdam are seen in Rotterdam, Netherlands, November 1, 2022. REUTERS/Piroschka van de Wouw/File Photo

The Dutch government said on Monday it had tightened export controls for all military and 'dual use' goods destined for Israel.

All direct exports and the transit of these goods to Israel will be checked to see if they comply with European regulations, and will no longer be covered by general export licences, the government said in a letter to parliament.

"This is desirable considering the security situation in Israel, the Palestinian territories and the wider region," foreign minister Caspar Veldkamp and trade minister Reinette Klever wrote, Reuters reported.

"Exporters will still be able to request permits, that will then be checked against European regulations."

The government said no military goods for Israel had been exported from the Netherlands under a general permit since Israel started its war in Gaza following the attacks by Hamas on October 7, 2023.

It said that the general licence for the export of "low risk information security goods", such as routers for network security, was frequently used for export to Israel.

It estimated that between 50 and 100 permits for the export of those goods would now have to be requested on an individual basis.

A Dutch court last year ordered the government to block all exports of F-35 fighter jet parts to Israel over concerns they were being used to violate international law during the war in Gaza.