General manager Tedros Ghebreyesus: “This is a moment to celebrate but it is also a moment to reflect”. The risk of new variants remains
“The global Covid health emergency is over.” This was stated by the director general of WHO Tedros Ghebreyesus. The state of health emergency had been declared on January 30, 2020. “This is a moment to celebrate but it is also a moment to reflect. Lives have been lost that should not have been lost, in three years there have been at least twenty million deaths. We promise our children and grandchildren that we will never make the same mistakes again,” he added. “Remember the sacrifices made so that it doesn’t happen again,” said Health Minister Orazio Schillaci.
Photogallery – Covid, the memory of the victims in Bergamo
In three years 20 million dead “At the start of the pandemic, there were around 100 cases of Covid-19 outside China and there were no reported deaths. In the three years since then the world has turned upside down: around 7 million deaths have been reported by WHO , but we know that the estimate is many times higher, equal to at least 20 million dead”, highlighted Ghebreyesus.
The risk of new variants remains “It is with great hope that I now declare the end of Covid-19 as a global health emergency, but still this does not mean that Covid is over in terms of global health threat,” continued the WHO director-general. “The risk of new emerging variants that can cause new waves of cases and deaths remains. The worst thing that countries can do now – he warned – is to use this news to lower their guard, to dismantle the system they have built and to launch to people the message that Covid is no longer something to worry about”.
Covid has been much more than a health crisis “As we speak – said Ghebreyesus – thousands of people around the world are fighting for their lives in intensive care and millions continue to live with the debilitating effects of the post-Covid condition. The virus is here to stay. It is still killing and is still changing”. Covid, continued Ghebreyesus, “has been much more than a health crisis: it has caused economic upheaval, wiping out trillions from GDP and pushing millions into poverty. It has caused social upheaval, with border closures and millions of people affected by isolation, depression and anxiety. The pandemic has now been on a downward trend for more than a year, with immunization increasing and mortality decreasing with less pressure on health systems. This has allowed many countries to return to life as we knew it before the pandemic”.
Schillaci: “Remember the sacrifices made so that it doesn’t happen again” For the Minister of Health Orazio Schillaci “from today we can say that the Covid19 health emergency is behind us”. “My thoughts go first of all to the doctors and health and social care workers who spared no energy to fight this global nightmare and to the people who didn’t make it – said the minister -. In their memory we must not forget this terrible experience and we must strengthen research, health structures and territorial assistance so that nothing like this will ever happen again”.