On average, more than two million cases of COVID-19 were recorded per day worldwide during the week of January 1-7, a number that doubled in ten days, according to an AFP tally.

An average of 2,106,118 daily cases were registered over the past seven days. The threshold of one million daily cases was crossed during the week of December 23-29, 2021.

The number of new daily cases has increased by 270% since the discovery of the Omicron variant in late November 2021 in Botswana and South Africa.

The vast majority of new cases are currently detected in Europe (7,211,290 cases in seven days, +47% compared to the previous week) and in the United States and Canada (4,808,098 cases, +76%). These two regions respectively account for 49% and 33% of the cases registered in the world in one week.

The COVID-19 virus is accelerating hard on almost all continents: in Oceania (369,313 cases in seven days, +224%), in Latin America and the Caribbean (1,126,862 cases, +148%), in the Middle East ( 209,021 cases in seven (+116%) and in Asia (714,017 cases, +145%).

Only Africa currently records balanced numbers (304,224 cases in seven days). But pollution is present, as in Europe and the US/Canada region, at the highest levels since the start of the pandemic.

However, the current wave of pollution is not accompanied by an increase in deaths. Over the past seven days, an average of 6,237 deaths were recorded per day worldwide, the lowest level since the end of October 2020, in nearly 15 months. Recently, as many as 8,049 daily deaths were recorded between November 29 and December 5, right after the discovery of the Omicron variant.

These figures are based on reports that the health authorities in each country transmit on a daily basis. Une part importante des cas les moins graves ou asymptomatiques reste non détectée malgré l’intensification du dépistage dans de nombreux pays depuis le début de la pandémie, après la découverte du virus fin fin 2019. for the other.