WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the declaration during a May 5 news conference held at the global health body's headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland.
"For more than a year, the pandemic has been on a downward trend with population immunity increasing from vaccination and infection, mortality decreasing and the pressure on health systems easing," he told reporters.
"This trend has allowed most countries to return to life as we knew it before COVID-19. It's therefore with great hope that I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency."
During the press conference, Tedros remarked that COVID-19 "has been so much more than [a] health crisis" and proceeded to enumerate the extent of the damage it inflicted on the world.
"It has caused severe economic upheaval – erasing trillions from [gross domestic product], disrupting travel and trade, shuttering businesses, and plunging millions into poverty," he said. "It has [also] caused severe social upheaval with borders closed, movement restricted, schools shut and millions of people experiencing loneliness, isolation, anxiety and depression."
Official numbers from the WHO stated that almost seven million people have died from COVID-19 since the global health body first declared the public health emergency on Jan. 30, 2020. But according to Tedros, the actual number is at least 20 million.
Despite this, the WHO director-general also emphasized during the news conference that it is high time for countries around the world to transition from doing an emergency response to managing COVID-19 like other infectious diseases.
Public health emergency may end, but medical tyranny is here to stay
The WHO's decision comes as the U.S. is set to end its national public health emergency on May 11.
According to Reuters, the Biden administration will end COVID-19 emergency declarations almost three years after they were first announced. Former President Donald Trump first announced the public health emergency in 2020. Incumbent President Joe Biden, who succeeded Trump, repeatedly extended the emergency measures.
In a statement, the White House's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) said the declarations would be extended one final time until May 11 and then terminated. "This wind-down would align with the [Biden] administration's previous commitments to give at least 60 days' notice prior to termination of the public health emergency," the OMB added. (Related: Biden signs GOP-led bill that ends COVID-19 national emergency.)
Millions of Americans are receiving free COVID-19 tests, vaccines and treatments – all paid for by the government. Private insurance companies and government health plans will cover the cost of these when the public health emergency expires on May 11.
While the pandemic may be over, Tedros insinuated that the medical tyranny first implemented at the height of COVID-19 must remain. The WHO director-general warned against complacency.
"[COVID-19] has left and continues to leave deep scars on our world. Those scars must serve as a permanent reminder of the potential for new viruses to emerge, with devastating consequences. As a global community, the suffering we have endured, the painful lessons we have learned, the investments we have made and the capacities we have built must not go to waste," he said.
"[The] virus is here to stay. It is still killing, and it's still changing. The worst thing any country could do now is to use this news as a reason to let down its guard, to dismantle the systems it has built, or to send the message to its people that COVID-19 is nothing to worry about."
Visit Pandemic.news for more stories about COVID-19.
Watch this clip from "Bannon's War Room" about the WHO's digital health tyranny.
This video is from the Rick Langley channel on Brighteon.com.
More related stories:
President Biden to extend COVID-19 "national emergency" status.
World Health Organization pushing for global vaccine passport scheme.
World Health Organization's pandemic treaty spells DOOM for democracy.
The HighWire: Extending COVID emergency prolongs medical tyrants' grip on the population.
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