The World Health Organization said that cases in its
53-country European region, which stretches as far east as several former
Soviet republics in central Asia, recorded an 18% increase in COVID-19 cases
over the last week — a fourth straight weekly increase for the area.
In WHO’s weekly epidemiological report on COVID-19, Europe
also saw a 14% increase in deaths. That amounted to more than 1.6 million new
cases and over 21,000 deaths.
The United States tallied the largest number of new cases
over the last seven days -- nearly 513,000 new cases, though that was a 12%
drop from the previous week – and over 11,600 deaths, which was about the same
number as the previous week, WHO said.
Britain was second at more than 330,000 new cases. Russia,
which has chalked up a series of national daily records for COVID-19 deaths in
recent days, had nearly a quarter million new cases over the last week.
WHO officials have pointed to a number of factors including
relatively low rates of vaccination in some countries in eastern Europe.
Countries including Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Moldova and Georgia had some of
the highest rates of infection per 100,000 people in the last week.
Overall, WHO’s vast Americas region — which has tallied the
most deaths of any region from the pandemic, at more than 2.7 million — saw a
1% uptick in deaths over the last week, even as cases fell by nine percent.
Cases in WHO’s southeast Asia region, which includes populous countries like
India and Indonesia, fell 8 percent even as deaths rose 13 percent over the
last week. -AP
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