World Health Organisation (WHO) Regional director for Europe, Hans Kluge has said that Europe has seen a huge spike in coronavirus cases since the easing of the lockdown.
The WHO have placed 30 countries on alert following the surges of coronavirus across Europe.
Kluge said, “Last week, Europe saw an increase in weekly cases for the first time in months.
“Thirty countries have seen increases in new cumulative cases over the past two weeks.
“In 11 of these countries, accelerated transmission has led to very significant resurgence that if left unchecked will push health systems to the brink once again in Europe.”
Hospitals are preparing for the next wave of coronavirus infections across Europe, after borders lifted restrictions allowing people to cross into other countries.
This comes after the WHO Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus warned that there will be 1m more infections by next week.
As of today, over 9.1m are infected with the virus globally and Dr Ghebreyesus expects this to surpass 10m within the next week.
He said that this is a “sober reminder” of coronavirus’s continued prevalence.
Speaking at the WHO’s media briefing on Wednesday, Dr Tedros said, “More than 9.1m cases of Covid-19 have now been reported to WHO, and more than 470,000 deaths.
“In the first month of this outbreak, less than 10,000 cases were reported to WHO. In the last month, almost 4m cases have been reported.
“We expect to reach a total of 10m cases within the next week.
“This is a sober reminder that even as we continue [research and development] into vaccines and therapeutics, we have an urgent responsibility to do everything we can with the tools we have now to suppress transmission and save lives.”
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