Covid still a threat to Europe – travel should be avoided, says WHO

Vaccines work against new variants but increased mobility may lead to more transmission'

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Covid vaccines in use in Europe appear to protect against all new variants but progress in region remains fragile" and international travel should be avoided to prevent pockets of transmission quickly spreading into dangerous resurgences", the World Health Organization has said.

Weekly official cases in Europe have fallen by almost 60% from 1.7m in mid-April to nearly 685,000 last week with deaths also in decline, the WHO regional director, Hans Kluge, said on Thursday, but incidence rates remained stubbornly high in eight countries.