“As the new year approaches, we must all learn the painful lessons that this year has taught us. 2022 should be the end of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Mr. Gebreyesus said (quoted by Reuters).
Earlier, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said that countries should take urgent measures to achieve vaccination of 40% of the population by the end of 2021. In his opinion, due to the inequality in the distribution of vaccines, coronavirus variants may “get out of control.”
The head of the WHO said that the new strain of the coronavirus “omicron” is spreading faster than the “delta” variant. It infects people who have been vaccinated or have already had COVID-19.
In its report, WHO noted that the omicron strain carries “very high” global risks. Concerns are related to the fact that omicron has an unprecedented number of mutations in the spike protein, which makes this variant more contagious than its predecessors.