WHO: Covid-19 No Longer a Global Health Emergency

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared COVID-19 no longer a global health emergency. The decision was made on the advice of the Covid-19 emergency committee, a panel of independent experts.

“It’s with great hope that I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.

The U.N. health agency’s officials said that even though the emergency phase was over, the pandemic hasn’t ended, noting recent spikes in cases in Southeast Asia and the Middle East. WHO says thousands of people are still dying from the virus every week, and millions of others are suffering from debilitating, long-term effects.

In the U.S., the public health emergency declaration made regarding COVID-19 is set to expire on May 11, when wide-ranging measures to support the pandemic response, including vaccine mandates, will end.

Read more about the decision here.