World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared the Delta Variant of COVID-19 as the most transmissible mutation to date. Director-General, WHO, Tedros Ghebreyesus disclosed that delta co had been identified in at least 85 countries and is “spreading rapidly among unvaccinated populations”. “As some countries ease public health and social measures, we are starting to see increases in transmission around the world,” he said.
The Director-General acknowledged that new variants were expected, saying “that’s what viruses do, they evolve” and stressed that by preventing transmission, we can stem the emergence of variants.
“It’s quite simple: more transmission, more variants. Less transmission, fewer variants,” he said, noting that it is even more urgent today to prevent transmission by consistently using public health and social measures along with vaccines.
In Nigeria, the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has reported the death of a Nigerian from the coronavirus disease after recording 29 new infections across seven states of the federation thereby raising the country’s total infection tally to 167,430 and 2,119 deaths.
While addressing the new variants, Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO Technical Lead on COVID-19, said “the world situation is very fragile” and “countries must be cautious”. She added that the delta variant can make the epidemic curve exponentially.
According to the WHO expert, “there is a constellation of variants circulating,” including sub-variants, four of which are very worrying. “Vaccines and treatments work, but these viruses can evolve and the existing shots “may not work” over time, emphasising again that to minimise outbreaks, everyone must continue to maintain public health measures.
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