Is the COVID Global Health Emergency Finally Over? Here’s What WHO Says

The time has finally come for countries to treat COVID like any other infectious disease instead of addressing it as an emergency response. Global deaths related to COVID have steadily fallen from January to April 2023. This trend signals the recession of one of the most deadly and economically devastating pandemic in our modern times. However, the risk of new emerging variants still remains.

Transition in COVID Public Health Emergency

After affecting much of the world economies due to lockdowns, COVID is no longer a concern for global health emergency. This was confirmed by World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during the fifteenth meeting of the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR) Emergency Committee, where he reported the latest status of the coronavirus 2019 disease (COVID-19) pandemic.

This decision came after the U.S decided to end its public health emergency on May 4, 2023. U.S. President Joseph Biden that immediately ends the coronavirus national emergency. Other countries have also made their own decisions regarding COVID.

During the meeting, the COVID emergency committee of the WHO highlighted the declining cases of deaths and hospitalizations and the rising levels of population immunity against the coronavirus. For more than a year, the pandemic showed a downward trend due to increasing immunity of people from vaccination and infection, WHO reported. This results to decreased mortality and pressure on health systems.

Despite this recommendation, Tedros reminded that the risk of emerging new variant is still present and can lead to another surge. He also gave warning to national governments not to dismantle the defense systems they had to fight the coronavirus.

"With great hope I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency," Ghebreyesus reported.

The announcement did not seem to come as a surprise since Tedros reported in January 2023 that the pandemic might be at a transition stage. Although the public health emergency is over, but the threat posed by COVID is still present especially to individuals who are vulnerable to the disease, such as the elderly and those who are immunocompromised.

Meanwhile, epidemiologist Salim Abdool Karim, the director of the Centre for the AIDS Programme of Research in South Africa, claims that there are no fast rules in determining whether public health emergency of international concern is over. He emphasized that we are just in a different level where a large numbers of deaths is not seen in hospitals.

Global Impact of the Pandemic

WHO first declared the novel coronavirus as a concern for public health emergency on January 30, 2020, after emerging from China and spreading across several countries in the world. Since then, travel restrictions and border closures were recommended worldwide due to the virulent nature of the disease. Normal public activities were also shut down by the governments in a desperate effort to stop the spread of the virus. As a result of these restrictions, the world economy suffered from severe downturn and social interactions were also disrupted.

For three years, almost 7 million people around the world have died from this disease. In January 2021, the rate of deaths related to COVID reached its peak of over 100,000 people per week, but it has slowed down to just almost 3, 500 per week in April 24, 2023.