Almost 10,000 Chinese coronavirus-related deaths were reported in December as the number of hospitalizations rose, the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) noted Wednesday.
The agency said hospitalizations jumped 42 percent across 50 countries, and medical facilities saw a 62 percent rise in patients placed in intensive care units (ICU), Deutsche Welle (DW) reported Thursday.
W.H.O. chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, “Although 10,000 deaths a month is far less than the peak of the pandemic, this level of preventable deaths is not acceptable.”
Coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, “is a sickness caused by a virus called severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). This virus is a coronavirus,” per the Mayo Clinic.
Symptoms are usually mild to moderate, and many patients recover well on their own. However, some cases may be more serious and can lead to death, the clinic’s website said.
The recent DW article added, “Maria Van Kerkhove, technical lead at the global health agency for COVID-19, cited an uptick in respiratory diseases across the world due to the coronavirus but also flu, rhinovirus, and pneumonia.”
In September, Breitbart News reported that Ghebreyesus wanted Beijing to share information on the origins of the Chinese coronavirus.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (L), director general of the World Health Organization, shakes hands with Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) before a meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on January 28, 2020. (Naohiko Hatta/Pool Photo via AP, File)
“The genesis of the pandemic still remains unclear nearly four years after the first cases emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan, and Tedros seeks access to put an end to speculation — if given permission,” the outlet continued:
The virus was first identified in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December 2019, with many suspecting it spread in a live animal market before fanning out around the world and killing nearly seven million people. Others point to it being a laboratory creation that escaped into the city of Wuhan.
The JN.1 variant is currently the dominant variant, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health reported Tuesday.
“Symptoms of JN.1 infection are very similar to those of previous omicron variants, and it doesn’t seem to cause more severe disease, either,” the report said.
