COVID-19: Red spreads to China, Southeast Asia surges

According to the epidemiological report that Nguoi Lao Dong Newspaper received from WHO on the morning of May 26, in the most recent 28-day statistical cycle, the world recorded nearly 2.3 million new cases and nearly 15,000 new deaths due to COVID-19.

The "hottest" of these is the Western Pacific , an epidemic area that includes part of East-Southeast Asia, Australia and the Pacific Islands.

COVID-19: Màu đỏ lan đến Trung Quốc, Đông Nam Á tăng mạnh - Ảnh 1.

The map shows the change in the rate of new cases with orange and red representing increases and sharp increases; green and blue representing decreases and sharp decreases - Photo: WHO

The region reported more than 1.052 million new COVID-19 cases, even as many countries in the region said they had reduced testing. That was up 38% from the previous cycle. The Western Pacific also reported 1,456 new deaths, up 9%.

The red and orange colors that cover most of the region on both maps represent the change in the rate of new cases and new deaths, compared to the previous 28-day period.

While red and orange have covered the geographic Southeast Asia, Australia, Japan, and Korea regions since last week, the biggest change this week is that red has appeared in China on both maps, indicating the end of the sharp decline cycle after the late 2022 - early 2023 wave.

The good news is that Vietnam is no longer listed among countries with the largest changes in rates or number of recorded cases like a few weeks ago.

In this region, Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, and Brunei have had the largest change in case rates, although the highest number of cases reported came from South Korea (462,726 cases, up 52%), Japan (164,367 cases, down 24%) and Australia (125,992 cases, up 49%), which are also the three countries that account for most of the reported deaths.

40% of Western Pacific countries are still reporting high increases in new COVID-19 cases (increases above 20%).

The Southeast Asia epicenter (which includes parts of Southeast Asia and geographical South Asia) reported its first decline in cases in weeks, falling 31% despite a 61% increase in deaths. The decline was largely due to a slowdown in India and West Asian countries, although India still reported the highest number of cases and deaths (95,472 cases, 503 deaths).

The highest increases were recorded in Indonesia (up 92%), Thailand (357%) and Myanmar (1,235%). However, Southeast Asia still ranks fourth in the world in terms of the number of cases.

The second and third highest number of cases were in Europe (572,906 cases) and the Americas (484,889 cases), down 45% and 41% respectively compared to the previous cycle. The Eastern Mediterranean and Africa reported negligible cases.

XBB.1.5 remains the dominant variant globally with a share of 41.57%. However, this share is being eclipsed by the rise of XBB.1.16 (13.17%), XBB.1.9.1 (15.65%), XBB.1.9.2 (5.15%), XBB.2.3 (3.59%) and other XBBs (10.8%).

Currently, XBB.1.5 and XBB.1.16 are still classified as VOIs (variants of concern) while the other 4 XBB strains mentioned above, along with BA.2.75, CH.1.1, BQ.1, are classified as VUMs (variants under surveillance). Both VOIs and VUMs are lower than VOCs (variants of concern) such as the original strain, Alpha, Delta, Omicron...

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