A new wave of Covid-19 cases appears to be spreading in Europe. The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) published new data on Wednesday that showed Europe recorded an 8% rise in the week ending October 2. The WHO and ECDC noted that millions of people across Europe have yet to be vaccinated against Covid-19. They urged European countries to administer both flu and Covid vaccines ahead of an expected surge in cases of seasonal influenza.

This comes as China’s financial capital Shanghai reported 38 positive cases from the same quarantine, thereby imposing another lockdown ahead of the CCP Congress, the most important political event of the country held once every five years. Covid-19 cases have started ticking up across Europe.”Although we are not where we were one year ago, it is clear that the Covid-19 pandemic is still not over,” WHO’s Europe director, Hans Kluge, and ECDC’s director, Andrea Ammon, said in a joint statement.

Last week a health official in France said the country had entered an eighth wave of the virus. “Yes we are in the eighth wave”, said Brigitte Autran, who is a member of the government’s vaccination strategic board. Ms Austran added: “all the indicators are on the up”. France’s coronavirus figures published on October 3 showed that the seven-day average of daily new cases had reached 45,631, its highest level since August 2.

Covid on the rise

A word from the Regional Director of Europe

“At this time last year, WHO/Europe spoke about a new wave of COVID-19 sweeping across the Region, driven by the Delta variant amid the lifting of restrictions and increased social mixing.  It’s now abundantly clear we’re in a similar situation to last summer – only this time the ongoing COVID-19 wave is being propelled by sub-lineages of the Omicron variant, notably BA.2 and BA.5, with each dominant sub-lineage of Omicron showing clear transmission advantages over the previously circulating viruses. 

This forecast presents a huge challenge to the health workforce in country after country, already under enormous pressure from dealing with unrelenting crises since 2020.  Consider the current situation: The European Region has seen a tripling of new COVID-19 cases over the past 6 weeks, with close to 3 million new cases reported last week, accounting for nearly half of all new cases globally. While hospitalization rates due to COVID-19 have doubled in the same period, intensive care unit admissions have so far remained relatively low.

Statics about the Covid rise

The strategy calls on countries to relaunch mitigation efforts and be ready to respond to an increased burden on their healthcare systems. The consistent application of the following 5 pandemic stabilizers will continue to be critical to protect people this autumn and winter:   

• increasing vaccine uptake in the general population;  
• administering a second booster dose to immunocompromised people aged 5 and above and their close contacts, and considering offering a second booster to specific at-risk groups, at least 3 months after their last dose;
• promoting mask-wearing indoors and on public transportation;
• ventilating crowded and public spaces (such as schools, offices and public transport); and 
• applying rigorous therapeutic protocols for those at risk of severe disease. ” 

How cases have been increasing