‘Let’s bring back masks…': Epidemiologist on WHO's statement on long Covid
1 min read 26 Oct 2022, 10:46 AM ISTThe University of Washington, in an analysis, said that global Covid-19 infections are projected to rise slowly to about 18.7 million average daily cases by February next year from the current 16.7 million daily driven by the northern hemisphere's winter months.
PremiumWorld Health Network's co-founder Eric Feigl-Ding, giving reference of WHO official's statement on long Covid-19, on Wednesday appealed the countries to ‘bring back masks’. Several countries have lifted the mask mandate in view of declining Covid-19 cases.
Taking to Twitter, epidemiologist Eric Feigl-Ding said, “There you have it—@WHO official says: the more times a person gets COVID, the more likely they are to be 'unlucky' and get #longCOVID, which “none of us want because it can be so serious". Let’s #BringBackMasks & bring in ventilation & air disinfection."
Meanwhile, the University of Washington, in an analysis, said that global Covid-19 infections are projected to rise slowly to about 18.7 million average daily cases by February next year from the current 16.7 million daily driven by the northern hemisphere's winter months.
The increase in infections is not expected to cause a surge in deaths, the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) said. It forecast that global daily deaths would average 2,748 people on Feb. 1 compared with around 1,660 now.
IHME estimates that daily infections in the United States will increase by a third to more than a million, driven by students returning to school and cold weather-related seasonal illness, as per Reuters reports.
A surge in Germany has peaked already, it said in its report on Oct.24 , and expects cases to fall by more than a third to around 190,000 by February.
IHME's analysis also shows that the new Omicron subvariant XBB, which is currently driving a surge in hospitalizations in Singapore, is more transmissible but less severe, Reuters reported.
The global impact of XBB is expected to be muted by the fact that people who were previously infected with the BA.5 subvariant of Omicron likely have immunity against it, the report shows.
(With Reuters inputs)
