COVID pandemic no longer a global emergency, says WHO.

WHO Declares COVID-19 No Longer a Global Emergency

The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed on Friday that COVID-19 is no longer a global emergency. The deadly virus was declared a global emergency over three years ago, but for the last year, the pandemic has been on a downward trend. WHO director general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that “life has been allowed to return to normal.”

Lessons Learned from COVID-19

“COVID-19 has been so much more than a health crisis, disrupting economies, travel, shattering businesses and plunging millions into poverty,” Ghebreyesus said in a press conference on Friday. “Therefore, with great hope, I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency,” he added. However, Ghebreyesus went on to say that the public shouldn’t forget the extensive damage from COVID. “The painful lessons we have learned cannot go to waste,” he continued. “We owe it to those we have lost to liberate those investments, to build on those capacities, to learn from those lessons and make sure that suffering leads to lasting change.”

Risk of New Variants and Future Emergencies

Ghebreyesus also warned that the risk of new variants still remains and there’s a risk of another global health emergency being declared again if there is a significant rise in COVID-19 cases or deaths. “That does not mean COVID-19 is over as a global health threat,” Tedros said, adding he wouldn’t hesitate to reconvene experts to reassess the situation should COVID-19 “put our world in peril.”

Impact of COVID-19

WHO first declared COVID-19 a global emergency on Jan. 30, 2020. At the time, there were less than 10,000 cases and most of them were in China. Ghebreyesus also noted that 7 million deaths were officially reported — but estimated the total was likely closer to 20 million. “COVID has changed our world and it has changed us,” he said, acknowledging that “COVID-19 has left and continues to leave deep scars on our world.”

Vaccine Progress

There’s been an estimated 764 million cases of COVID-19 globally and about 5 billion people have received at least one dose of vaccine. Many other countries, including Germany, France and Britain, dropped many of their COVID mandates last year. The public health emergency declaration made regarding COVID-19 is set to expire on May 11 in the U.S. At its expiration, the wide-ranging measures to support the pandemic response, including vaccine mandates, will end.

Final Thoughts

While the declaration that COVID-19 is no longer a global emergency is a positive step, it’s important to remember the impact the virus has had on the world and the potential for new variants to emerge. The lessons learned from this pandemic must be used to create lasting change and prevent future global health emergencies.

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