Hidden Risks in Africa’s Low COVID Cases, Fourth Wave?
Model insights into emerging scenarios with variants of concern
Key Highlights
§ It has become a global urgency to calibrate COVID-19 containment policies in informed ways that can avoid long-term economic recession from over-protection or eventually explosive health risks due to over-relaxation and pandemic fatigue.
§ To avoid falling below or exceeding the optimal standards needed to strike a healthy balance between protecting health and promoting the economy, the calibration of country COVID-19 containment measures must be informed by transparent and reliable data as well as scientifically sound decision models.
§ Based on the reported cumulative cases, Europe has become the region with the lowest probability of developing severe cases of COVID-19 (0.01%) followed by North America (0.03%) and Oceania (0.04%). As of July 5, 2021, Africa was above the global average (0.04%), with a probability of 0.08%, only second South America (0.09%) but above Asia (0.05%) and Kenya (0.06%).
§ Examined against her share of global COVID-19 cases (3%), Africa has been unique. The metrics as of July 5, 2021 show that the continent’s share of global COVID-19 deaths (3.7%) and of global severe cases (serious or critical — 5.9%) have been disproportionately higher. Africa’s case fatality rate of 2.6% has also been the second-highest in the world, after South America’s (3.1%).
