WHO: European countries seeing COVID surge lifted restrictions too soon

• NIAID director Anthony Fauci said earlier this week that while cases may rise, that increase might not be accompanied by a significant uptick in hospitalizations or deaths.

The big picture: "What we are seeing is that 18 out of 53 countries in our region see an increase in COVID-19 in the last week. However the mortality is still decreasing," Kluge said.

• Kluge noted that countries seeing a spike, in particular, include the U.K., Ireland, Germany, France, Italy, Greece, and Cyprus.
• One reason is the higher transmissibility of the BA.2 variant, but another is the decision by those countries to lift pandemic health restrictions.
• "Those countries are lifting the restrictions brutally, from too much to too few," Kluge said.

The bottom line: Kluge said he remained optimistic but "vigilant," attributing his optimism to the large amount of immunity due to vaccines or prior infection, decreasing seasonality as winter finishes, and the fact that “we know Omicron is milder, but in fully vaccinated people, including a booster.”