New York, Europe Brief News – The World Health Organization (WHO) said half of Europe will catch Omicron.
WHO Regional Director for Europe Hans Kluge said a “west-to-east tidal wave” of Omicron was sweeping across the region. The Delta variant is on top of a surge, he added.
The projection was based on the seven million new cases reported across Europe in the first week of 2022.
The number of infections has more than doubled in a two-week period.
“Today the Omicron variant represents a new west-to-east tidal wave, sweeping across the region on top of the Delta surge that all countries were managing until late 2021,” Dr Kluge told a news conference.
He quoted the Seattle-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation as forecasting that “more than 50 percent of the population in the region will be infected with Omicron in the next six to eight weeks”.
The WHO has earlier warned of ‘tsunami’ of COVID cases in the near future. The declaration was due to Omicron spread.
The WHO further warned of the risk posed by the Omicron variant after COVID-19 case numbers shot up by 11 percent globally last week.
Omicron is behind the rapid virus spikes, the WHO said in its COVID weekly epidemiological update on Wednesday.
The update came after a number of countries reported record-high infection figures in recent days.
In some parts, the increase followed the emergence of the new Omicron variant, first detected in South Africa.
