WHO Europe chief urges nations to keep up virus quarantines

WHO Europe chief urges nations to keep up virus quarantines GENEVA (AP) — The World Health Organization’s European director warned national governments Thursday against reducing the quarantine period for people potentially exposed to the coronavirus, even... AP NEWS

GENEVA (AP) — The World Health Organization’s European director warned national governments Thursday against reducing the quarantine period for people potentially exposed to the coronavirus, even as he acknowledged that COVID-19 “fatigue” was setting in with growing public resistance to the measures needed to control the pandemic.

Dr. Hans Kluge said that “even a slight reduction in the length of the quarantine” could have a significant effect on the spread of the virus which returned to “alarming rates of transmission” in Europe this month.

Kluge insisted that countries should only reduce the standard two-week quarantine period if it was scientifically justified. He offered to convene scientific discussions on the issue, if necessary.

WHO Europe’s 53-country region recorded more than 300,000 confirmed coronavirus cases in the last week, and more than half of the countries reported a rise of more than 10% in cases over the last two weeks, he said. Of those countries, seven had their cases jump by more than two-fold.

Such statistics should be “a wake-up call for all of us,” Kluge said.

He called for “regional coherence” and said that Europe’s response has been effective when “prompt and resolute. But the virus has shown (to be) merciless whenever partisanship and disinformation prevailed.”  ...