SOURCE: AL JAZEERA

(AL JAZEERA) — Coro­n­avirus in­fec­tions are in­creas­ing in every coun­try in the Amer­i­c­as and the Omi­cron vari­ant has been de­tect­ed in near­ly every na­tion in the re­gion, the Pan Amer­i­can Health Or­ga­ni­za­tion (PA­HO) said, putting pres­sure on al­ready strained health sys­tems.

In a week­ly vir­tu­al brief­ing on Wednes­day PA­HO Di­rec­tor Caris­sa Eti­enne said over the past week, COVID-19 in­fec­tions have near­ly dou­bled in the Amer­i­c­as, ris­ing from 3.4 mil­lion cas­es on Jan­u­ary 1st to 6.1 mil­lion on Jan­u­ary 8th.

“In­fec­tions are ac­cel­er­at­ing across every cor­ner of the re­gion of the Amer­i­c­as, and once again, our health sys­tems are be­ing chal­lenged as emer­gency room vis­its and hos­pi­tal­iza­tions are ris­ing,” Eti­enne said.

PA­HO said the Unit­ed States is re­port­ing the bulk of the new cas­es but Ar­genti­na and Paraguay are see­ing 300 per­cent in­crease in cas­es while Bo­livia, Ecuador, Pe­ru and Brazil are ex­pe­ri­enc­ing “sig­nif­i­cant” ris­es in new cas­es. PA­HO says 60 per­cent of Latin Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean are ful­ly vac­ci­nat­ed.