China's Respiratory Illness Surge Not As High As Pre-Covid: WHO Official
NDTV
Maria Van Kerkhove, the WHO official said, the increase appeared to be driven by a rise in the number of children contracting pathogens that two years of COVID restrictions have kept them away from.
The spike in respiratory illnesses that China is currently going through is not as high as before the COVID-19 pandemic, a World Health Organisation official said, reiterating that no new or unusual pathogens had been found in the recent cases.
Maria Van Kerkhove, acting director of the WHO's department of epidemic and pandemic preparedness and prevention, said the increase appeared to be driven by a rise in the number of children contracting pathogens that two years of COVID restrictions have kept them away from.
"We asked about comparisons prior to the pandemic. And the waves that they're seeing now, the peak is not as high as what they saw in 2018-2019," Van Kerkhove told health news outlet STAT in an interview on Friday.
