The COVID-19 pandemic continued to abate around the world this week, slowing down in every region.
Here is a state of play based on AFP's database.
17 Percent Drop
After a surge which lasted for three-and-a-half months, the average number of global daily cases dropped for a second week in a row, receding by 17 percent to 2.52 million, according to an AFP tally to Thursday.
The confirmed cases only reflect a fraction of the actual number of infections, with varying counting practices and levels of testing in different countries.
All Regions Down
Every region of the world saw an improvement over the past seven days.
Cases dropped by two fifths, or 41 percent, in the United States (US) and Canada zone, by 30 percent in Africa, by 26 percent in the Latin America-Caribbean zone, by 13 percent in Asia, nine percent in Europe and two percent in the Middle East.
When a catch up in figures in Australia is discounted, the number of cases in Oceania dropped by around a quarter.
Main Spikes
Hong Kong saw the biggest spike in the number of new cases this week with a mighty 339 percent surge.
East Timor followed with an increase of 322 percent, Belarus with 169 percent more, Indonesia (up 141 percent) and Singapore (119 percent more).
Main Drops
Kosovo saw the biggest drop of the week with 54 percent fewer cases, followed by Kazakhstan with 52 percent less, Panama (-48 percent), Sweden (-47 percent) and Paraguay minus (-46 percent).
US Still Has Most Cases
The United States (US) remained the country with the highest number of new cases with 213,700 per day on average. Nevertheless, that was 41 percent down on last week.
Next in line came Germany with 192,400 cases a day, an increase of 14 percent and Russia on 177,600, a 41 percent spike.
On a per capita basis, the country with the most new cases over the week was Denmark with 5,425 per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by the Netherlands (4,738), Georgia (3,709), Estonia (3,544) and Latvia (3,504).
Deaths
The number of COVID-linked deaths increased by six percent globally, with 11,111 deaths per day, increasing for a fifth week in a row but albeit at a slower pace than previous weeks.
Even though the highly contagious Omicron variant led at its peak to four times more daily infections than previous waves, daily deaths remain far lower than their record high in January 2021 when they skirted 15,000.
The US recorded the most deaths this week with 2,708 per day, ahead of India (1,077) and Brazil (859).
The countries reporting the highest death rates in proportion to their population were all in the Balkans with Bosnia recording 10.2 per 100,000 inhabitants, Bulgaria (9.5), Northern Macedonia (9.2) and Croatia (8.3).