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As of Friday May 5, Covid-19 is no longer a global emergency. That’s according to the World Health Organization, which made the announcement today.
The news marks the end of a chapter in world history, where for the over three years since the WHO first gave the pandemic emergency status, Covid-19 destroyed lives and livelihoods, tanking economies and killing at least 7 million people around the world. “It’s with great hope that I declare Covid-19 over as a global health emergency,” said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.
Despite the welcome news today, WHO officials say this is not an all-clear. “That does not mean Covid-19 is over as a global health threat,” said the WHO director-general.
Despite this, much of the world has already dropped practically all pandemic-era precautions and restrictions, and Dr. Tedros acknowledged that the pandemic had been trending downwards for more than a year.
Now, the world must re-evaluate its response to the pandemic, and learn lessons from challenges and failure that will ensure future health threats are managed more successfully. The WHO itself has come under scrutiny for its approach to managing the pandemic, including intense criticism over what many scientific experts saw as a delay in recommending widespread masking in public, a delay some health officials say can be measured in lives. A belated acknowledgement that the virus was primarily spread via inhaled aerosol droplets rather than through surface contact is also being cited in criticisms of the WHO’s early posture towards Covid-19.
The United States will end its public health emergency measures instituted in the advent of Covid-19 next week. On May 11, vaccine mandates, enhanced benefit disbursements, and a host of other interventions will end, on the mainland and across U.S. territorial holdings.
