WHO says global COVID cases, deaths declined again last week

BERLIN (AP) — The World Health Organization says that the number of reported new COVID-19 cases worldwide decreased by nearly a quarter last week. That means there’s been a decline in reported infections since the end of March.

The Geneva-based U.N. health agency said in a weekly report that nearly 5.59 million cases were reported between April 11 and 17. That’s 24% fewer than in the previous week.

The number of newly reported deaths dropped 21% to 18,215.

WHO said new cases declined in every region though only by 2% in the Americas.

The agency said that “these trends should be interpreted with caution as several countries are progressively changing their COVID-19 testing strategies, resulting in lower overall numbers of tests performed and consequently lower numbers of cases detected.”