The World Health Organisation on Thursday said the Delta variant of COVID-19 has led to a surge of coronavirus cases in the Middle East, causing a fourth wave and added that the infections and deaths were being reported among people who weren’t vaccinated.
“The rapid spread of the Delta variant across the Eastern Mediterranean Region and all other WHO regions is a major cause for concern,” Dr Ahmed Al-Mandhari, WHO regional director for the eastern Mediterranean told AFP. “We are now in the fourth wave of COVID-19 across the region,” Al-Mandhari added.
The delta variant has been reported in 15 out of the 22 countries in the Middle East and the worst affected have been Iran, Libya, Tunisia and Iraq—only 5 per cent of the population in the Middle Eastern nations have been fully vaccinated. The other nations in the region are Afghanistan, Bahrain, Djibouti, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syrian Arab Republic, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
According to WHO, infections in the region have increased by 55 per cent. The region is facing shortages of oxygen tanks and intensive care beds.
“Admission and hospitalisation rates have increased in the last few weeks, and some referral hospitals are reaching full capacity and facing a shortage of intensive care beds and oxygen supplies,” WHO said.
Some of the middle eastern nations are leading in vaccination rates-- over 76 per cent of the population in UAE have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine and about 69 per cent of Bahrain’s population has been fully vaccinated.
WHO said that COVID management includes ensuring that vaccination reaches a vast portion of the population, along with producing efficient vaccines. “Until and unless vaccination coverage is increased equitably for everybody, everywhere, the virus will continue to circulate and mutate to produce new variants,” WHO said.
WHO has set a target for 10 per cent of the population of all countries to be fully vaccinated by September. But, this target may not be met unless the richer nations do not donate vaccines to the poorer nations, who are still struggling to gain access to vaccination doses. As per WHO’s target, 70 per cent of the population of all countries are expected to be full vaccinated by mid-2022.
