In global COVID-19 developments, new cases last week declined for the fourth week in a row, according to the latest weekly snapshot from the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Biden administration today asked US intelligence officials to double down on efforts to collect and analyze information on the source of SARS-CoV-2.
Global snapshot reveals hot spots
In its weekly epidemiological report, the WHO said much of the decline last week was driven by decreasing cases in Europe and South East Asia regions. Of five countries that had the most cases, India reported the most, with the other four all in the Americas: Brazil, Argentina, the United States, and Colombia.
Though cases are declining in many countries, even in India, illnesses levels are still on the rise in a number of others. Those reporting double-digit rises last week include Argentina (41%), Malaysia (32%), South Africa (31%), Kenya (27%), Indonesia (24%), and Pakistan (11%). Fifty three countries have detected the more transmissible B1617.2 variant, which was first found in India.
Officials from the WHO's Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) at a briefing today said cases and deaths are plateauing in the Americas at alarmingly high levels. PAHO Director Carissa Etienne, MBBS, said cases are rising in some Central American countries, including Costa Rica, Panama, Belize, and Honduras, where intensive care unit beds are more than 80% full.
As some Caribbean countries report rises, including Cuba, countries in South America that saw progress for a few weeks are now seeing cases rise again, including Uruguay, Argentina, and Brazil.
Bolivia's cases and deaths are rising dramatically, and Guyana is reporting its highest levels of cases and deaths.
In India, still the world's biggest hot spot, cases topped 27 million, with daily deaths rising above 4,000 again today. Officials said the country's number of patients with black fungus lung complication has now risen above 10,000, according to CNN.
Biden orders fresh look at virus source intelligence
In a statement today, US President Joe Biden said he asked the US intelligence community to double down on their efforts to collect and analyze information over the next 90 days that would clarify the source of the virus. The move follows renewed suspicions of a potential lab leak of SARS-CoV-2, triggered by a media report that referenced intelligence information that three Wuhan Institute of Virology researchers were sick with an unspecified infection a month before China reported the first cases to the WHO. Suspicions over a potential lab leak have become a flash point in political circles and among scientists.
In March, a WHO-led international joint mission to China didn't rule out a lab source, but said a leap from an intermediate animal carrier to humans is the most likely scenario.
Biden said the US intelligence community has coalesced around two likely scenarios—human contact with an infected animal or a lab accident—but has not reached a definitive conclusion. He added that two elements in the intelligence community lean toward the former, while one tilts toward the latter, with each side having low or moderate confidence. "The majority of elements do not believe there is sufficient information to assess one to be more likely than the other," the president said.
More global headlines
- The Maldives, an island chain near India and Sri Lanka, imposed strict measures today to curb its COVID-19 surge, which is complicated by a shortage of medical staff from India, according to Reuters.
- In Australia, officials reported six more cases in a Melbourne cluster, raising the total to 15, all from the same extended family.
- Asahi Shimbun, one of Japan's biggest newspapers and also one of the Tokyo Olympics sponsors, today called for the Summer Games to be cancelled, according to the Washington Post. The paper said confidence is low for holding a safe and secure event, adding that another worry is that the influx of visitors could overwhelm the country's medical system as it grapples with a heavy load of COVID patients in Japan's ongoing surge.
- The global total today climbed to 167,819,979 cases, with at least 3,483,864 deaths, according to the New York Times tracker.
