Illustrative photo (Source: Xinhua/ VNA)

“We have never been in a better position to end the pandemic,” Tedros said, noting that the number of deaths from COVID-19 last week was the lowest it had been since March of 2020.

The WHO urged all countries to invest in vaccinating 100% of the most at-risk groups, including healthcare workers and older people, and asked countries to keep testing and sequencing for the COVID-19 virus, and integrating effective treatment for COVID-19 into primary healthcare systems.

The world last week recorded 3.1 million new cases of COVID-19 (down 28% compared to the last 2 weeks) with about 11,000 fatalities (down 22% from the previous week). To date, more than 618 million people around the world have been infected with COVID-19, of which more than 6.5 million have died.