COVID-19 cases pick up speed around the word, except Latin America

PARIS: Except Latin America, the COVID-19 pandemic has picked up speed again this week in all regions of the world. Here is the global state of play according to a specialised AFP database.

First rise in weeks

The average number of new daily COVID-19 cases globally increased slightly by two percent to 377,000 over the past week, according to an AFP toll Thursday.

The increase was the first seen since late April when the pandemic reached a record level of 816,800 new daily cases.

The number of confirmed cases only reflects a fraction of the actual number of infections, with different countries also having varying counting practices and levels of testing.

Slide almost everywhere

Latin America and the Caribbean was the only region of the world this week to see an improvement, with 13 percent less cases compared to the previous week.

The pandemic surged back in all the other regions of the world: by 30 percent in Europe, 25 percent in Africa, 10 percent in the Middle East, five percent in the United States and Canada and four percent in Asia.

In Oceania the number of cases also increased, by 31 percent, but on only 323 cases per day.

Biggest spikes

On a country basis, Myanmar saw the biggest surge in new cases with 119 percent. Spain followed with 80 percent more, Britain 71 percent more, Tunisia 69 percent and Cuba 68 percent.

Biggest drops

Uruguay saw the highest drop of 35 percent less new cases, followed by Uganda (34 percent less), Brazil (30 percent), Chile (minus 21 percent) and the Dominican Republic minus 17 percent.

Most new cases

Despite a marked slowdown of 30 percent, Brazil still recorded the most new cases over the past week with 54,100 a day, followed by India (47,000) and Colombia (29,900).

On a per capita basis, the countries which recorded the most cases this week were the Seychelles with 975 per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by Mongolia with 468.

The two countries are among the most advanced in terms of their vaccination drives with 68 percent and 53 percent of their populations completely vaccinated respectively.

The Seychelles uses a mixture of China's Sinopharm and AstraZeneca, while Mongolia almost completely uses Sinopharm.

Deaths decrease

Brazil and India again mourned the most deaths by far over the past week, with 1,565 and 1,068 per day respectively.

At a world level the number of daily deaths again decreased this week, by five percent to 7,958.

Vaccination race

Portugal led the vaccination race this week (of countries with more than a million inhabitants), jabbing 1.49 percent of its population each day.

China followed with 1.42 percent, the Netherlands (1.25 percent), Canada (1.23 percent) and Uruguay (1.18 percent).

Even though they vaccinated less quickly, the United Arab Emirates which administered 155 first or second doses per 100 inhabitants, Bahrain and Israel (both 125), Chile (120), the United Kingdom (115) and the United States (99) are among the countries with the most advanced vaccination campaigns.