The World Health Organization reported on Tuesday the number of coronavirus cases worldwide has dropped by 16% last week, highlighting a month-long fall in infections.
WHO made the revelation in its weekly report. The report said deaths fell by 10%, another metric that has consistently declined.
Overall, WHO reported there were more than 10 million new cases and about 60,000 deaths globally. The report relayed the Western Pacific region was the only place where the coronavirus increased, with about a third more cases than the previous week.
Specifically, deaths increased by 22% in the Western Pacific and about 4% in the Middle East, while declining elsewhere.
The report said the omicron variant is the dominant coronavirus strain throughout the world. The report said 99.5% of active coronavirus cases were due to omicron while delta consisted of 0.3%.
WHO said the remaining variants—beta, gamma, lambda, or mu—haven’t been reported within the last month.
The worldwide fall in coronavirus cases comes as countries such as Great Britain, Sweden, and Denmark have terminated almost all of their coronavirus restrictions as cases have dropped dramatically while inoculation campaigns have progressed in the U.S. In the U.S., scientists and public health experts have estimated nearly 73% of the population is now immune to omicron.
Future spikes of the virus will require fewer interventions to control epidemics. Despite the decline in the coronavirus metrics, WHO said it is too early to declare the pandemic over and must be controlled out of fear of a more deadly strain to emerge.