Weekly epidemiological update on COVID-19 - 25 August 2023

Overview

In the last 28-day period (24 July to 20 August 2023), nearly 1.5 million new COVID-19 cases and over 2000 deaths were reported from WHO’s six regions, an increase of 63% and a decrease of 48%, respectively, compared to the previous 28 days. As of 20 August 2023, over 769 million confirmed cases and over 6.9 million deaths have been reported globally. Three WHO regions reported increases in the number of cases, while two regions reported decreases. While four WHO regions reported decreases in the number of deaths, the East Mediterranean Region reported an increase in deaths. In this WEU edition, we have included all available data from the Region of the Americas since the start of the pandemic up to 6 August 2023 in the global figures. Currently, reported cases do not accurately represent infection rates due to the reduction in testing and reporting globally. During this 28-day period, 44% (103 of 234) of countries reported at least one case to WHO – a proportion that has been declining since mid-2022.

In this edition, we include:

• The COVID-19 epidemiological update at the global and the regional levels
• An update on hospitalizations and ICU admissions
• An update on the SARS-CoV-2 variants of interest (VOI) and variants under monitoring (VUM)

Erratum: On 30 August 2023, the WEU edition 157 was corrected with the following text “In addition, one country (Switzerland) has reported detection of BA.2.86 in wastewater samples.”