Covid: Virus is ‘no longer global health emergency’, according to World Health Organisation

Covid-19 is no longer a global health emergency. This is the message from the World Health Organisation (WHO) just over three years since the pandemic broke out in March 2020.

Since then the UK has endured numerous lockdowns and lost hundreds of thousands of loved ones who died with the virus. But with life almost back to normal again, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said today (Friday, May 5): “It’s with great hope that I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency.”

However, he added that this “does not mean COVID-19 is over as a global health threat”. In May last year, WHO experts said the end of the pandemic was “in sight” as it published policy briefs for governments to follow on infection control, testing, vaccination and misinformation.

In April we also saw the NHS Covid app, which once dictated everything from if you could enter a restaurant to who you were allowed to spend Christmas with, switched off for the final time. It will be discontinued completely on May 16.

Covid-19 was declared a pandemic on March 11 2020. The virus triggered lockdowns and travel restrictions not just in the UK but across the world.

Since then, there have been more than six million Covid-related deaths worldwide.