Weekly epidemiological update on COVID-19 - 11 January 2022

Globally, during the week 3 – 9 January 2022, the new weekly COVID-19 cases increased markedly by 55%, while the new weekly deaths remained similar to those reported during the previous week. This corresponds to over 15 million new cases and over 43,000 new deaths. As of 9 January, over 304 million confirmed cases and over 5.4 million deaths have been reported.

All regions reported an increase in the incidence of weekly cases except for the Africa Region, which reported an 11% decrease. The South-East Asia region reported the largest increase in new cases last week (418%), followed by the Western Pacific Region (122%), the Eastern Mediterranean Region (86%), the Region of the Americas (78%) and the European Region (31%). New weekly deaths increased in the African Region (84%) and Region of the Americas (26%) while it remained similar to the previous week in the Western Pacific Region. A decrease in new weekly deaths was reported in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (11%), the European Region (10%) and in the South-East Asia Region (6%).

In this edition, we provide updates on the geographic distribution of circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern (VOCs), and summarize their phenotypic characteristics based on available studies.