WHO: Europe is the epicenter of pandemic despite vaccines
Geneva(AP): Top officials at the World Health Organization said Thursday that Europe has seen a more than 50% jump in coronavirus cases in the last month, making it the epicenter of the pandemic despite an ample supply of vaccines.
There may be plenty of vaccine available, but uptake of vaccine has not been equal, WHO emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan said during a press briefing on Thursday.
He called for European authorities to close the gap in vaccinations. However, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said countries that have immunized more than 40 per cent of their populations should stop and instead donate their doses to developing countries that have yet to offer their citizens a first dose.
No more boosters should be administered except to immuno-compromised people, Tedros said.
More than 60 countries have started giving booster doses to combat waning immunity before winter, when another COVID-19 wave is expected. In the United States, children ages 5 to 11 started getting COVID-19 shots this week after authorities decided the benefits outweighed the risks.
Earlier on Thursday, the director of WHO's 53-country Europe region, Dr. Hans Kluge, said the rising COVID-19 case counts are of grave concern.
Europe is back at the epicenter of the pandemic, where we were one year ago, Kluge said. He warned that coronavirus hospitalization rates more than doubled in the last week and predicted that on that trajectory, the region could see another 500,000 pandemic deaths by February, he said.
WHO Europe says the region, which stretches as far east as the former Soviet republics in Central Asia, tallied nearly 1.8 million new weekly cases, an increase of about 6% from the previous week, and 24,000 COVID-19 weekly deaths a 12% gain.
Kluge said the countries in the region were at varying stages of vaccination rollout and that regionwide an average of 47% of people were fully vaccinated. Only eight countries had 70% of their populations fully vaccinated.
The increase in Europe's COVID-19 marks the fifth consecutive week cases have risen across the continent, making it the only world region where COVID-19 is still increasing. The infection rate was by far the highest in Europe, which reported some 192 new cases per 100,000 people.
Sweden's chief epidemiologist, Anders Tegnell, said Thursday that we are clearly in another wave, and added that the increased spread is entirely concentrated in Europe. Several countries in Central and Eastern Europe have seen daily case numbers shoot up in recent weeks.
At an online briefing Thursday by the Amsterdam-based European Medicines Agency, experts urged people to get vaccinated.
The epidemiological situation in Europe is very concerning now as we head into the winter with increases in infection rates, hospitalization and we can also see the increase in fatalities, said Fergus Sweeney, the EMA's head of clinical studies and manufacturing task force.
He stressed that it's very important that everybody gets vaccinated or completes their dose of vaccination if they've already had a first dose but not a second dose. It's really important that we're all vaccinated because we are not all protected until everyone is protected in that respect.
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ED searches: Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah accuses Centre of targeting Cong leaders
Chamarajanagara (Karnataka) (PTI): Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday accused the central government and its agencies of consistently targeting Congress members by using searches on their properties, and questioned why similar action is not taken against BJP leaders.
He was reacting to searches conducted by the Enforcement Directorate on Monday on several individuals, among them the sons of Karnataka Congress MLA N A Haris and the grandson of former Union Cabinet minister K Rahman Khan, in connection with a cryptocurrency-linked money laundering case.
"The central government always targets Congress leaders. Will they raid the houses of BJP leaders?" Siddaramaiah said in response to a question. More than a dozen premises in the city were searched as part of the operation carried out by the ED under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The premises searched comprised those of Mohammed Haris Nalapad and Omar Farook Nalapad, the sons of the MLA; Aqeeb Khan, the grandson of veteran Congress leader K Rahman Khan; and an alleged crypto hacker, Srikrishna Ramesh, alias Sriki, officials said.
The money laundering case stems from Karnataka Police FIRs and charge sheets filed in a 2017 case involving the hacking of national and international websites, theft of bitcoins, and the sale of these stolen virtual digital assets (VDAs) through crypto platforms by the alleged hacker Sriki and his associates.
Mohammed Haris Nalapad, Omar Farook Nalapad, and Aqeeb Khan are alleged to be beneficiaries of the proceeds of crime generated through this crypto-linked activity, officials added.
