COVID-19 Coronavirus and other virus UK and World News Update 3rd February 2023
World COVID Statistics: 675,852,150 reported cases and 6,768,076 losses of life.
"Three years ago today, I declared a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) over the global spread of COVID-19 - the highest level of alarm under the International Health Regulations.
On Friday the Emergency Committee met to consider whether that remains the case. The committee has advised me that in its view, COVID-19 remains a global health emergency.
In the past 8 weeks, more than 170,000 people have lost their lives to COVID-19, and that's just the reported deaths; we know the actual number is much higher."
Dr Tedros, Head of the World Health Organisation, speaking on Monday.
Lets start with some good news. Ambulance handover times have improved dramatically. I don't know which genius sorted this out, but someone somewhere fixed this, and they should probably be in charge (as long as it isn't a cover up and all those people are piling up in a caretaker's closet.)
Down from highs of almost 4 hours of wasted time per handover (on average) in mid December and early January, to less than 15 minutes for most of the UK for the 3rd week of January. Even the South West is down to around 40 minutes.
Serious credit to all involved, and to numbers bloke Paul Mainwood for keeping his eye on it.