The WHO asks that the omicron threat not be underestimated: “It is spreading at a rate that we have not seen with any previous variant”
The director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, highlighted on Tuesday that 77 countries have already detected infections of the omicron variant, but the speed at which the infections of this new lineage are spreading makes one think which is “in the rest it is present even though it has not been detected”. “Ómicron is spreading at a rate that we have not seen with any previous variant,” he stressed.
The head of the WHO has reiterated that although most cases of people infected with the omicron variant are mild, action must be taken against its expansion as quickly as possible. “If we underestimate this variant of the virus, the large number of cases could once again overwhelm unprepared health systems,” he warned.
Tedros has had an impact on maintaining all the measures against the spread of the coronavirus that work, such as vaccination, masks, hand hygiene and social distance. “You have to do everything, consistently and you have to do it well,” he said.
Once again, the WHO has asked developed countries for more collaboration with the Covax platform, the organization that tries to provide vaccines to developing countries. Tedros has again asked that the booster doses not promote the “vaccine nationalism” that conditioned the distribution in the first phase of vaccination. “The WHO is not against booster doses; it is against inequality.” “Giving booster doses to those who are not at risk endangers the lives of those who have not received any vaccine,” he added. “The priority must be to vaccinate the unvaccinated, protect the least protected.”
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