OREANDA-NEWS. Doctor of Biological Sciences, Professor of the Department of Virology, Faculty of Biology, Moscow State University, Alexei Agranovsky, appreciated the statement of the World Health Organization (WHO) that the world is at the beginning of a new wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. The virologist shared his opinion on this matter with Lenta.ru.

Earlier, WHO Director General Tedros Adan Ghebreyesus made a statement regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. He reported a high rate of growth in morbidity in the world, as well as deaths from coronavirus. Ghebreyesus added that the number of deaths increased for the first time after declining in the previous ten weeks.

The WHO Director-General states that the Indian variant of the delta plus virus is one of the main drivers of the increase in transmission rates. He noted that this is "fueled by increased social contacts and mobility, as well as inconsistent application of proven health and social measures."

According to Agranovsky, the announcement by the WHO Director General of a new wave of the COVID-19 pandemic is necessary for the convenience of taking anti-coronavirus measures.

“People need to schematize processes and simplify notation. You can call outbreaks of infection waves. If it is convenient for taking adequate measures, let it be so,” said the virologist. He clarified that powerful drugs against coronavirus have not yet been developed and said that vaccination is "the only remedy before, during and after waves of infection."