PARIS, Jan 2, 2022 (BSS/AFP) - Europe has recorded over 100 million
coronavirus cases, more than a third of all infections worldwide, since the
start of the pandemic, an AFP tally Saturday showed.

  The continent has once again become the pandemic's epicentre in recent
months, and is battling an upsurge of cases spurred on by the highly
transmissible Omicron strain of the virus.

  The European region, including 52 countries and territories from the
Atlantic coast to Azerbaijan and Russia, has recorded 100,074,753 infections
of Covid-19 over the past two years, an AFP tally of official figures showed
at 1845 GMT.

  That is equivalent to more than a third of the 288,279,803 cases declared
worldwide since the outbreak of the pandemic in late 2019 in China.

  Of the European infections, more than 4.9 million have been reported over
the past seven days alone, with 17 out of 52 countries or territories beating
their previous record of most cases in a single week.

  France alone has recorded more than one million new cases over the past
week, which is equivalent to 10 percent of all positive cases it has
announced since the start of the pandemic.

  The countries with the highest ratio of infections per 100,000 inhabitants
in the world were all in Europe. Denmark scored worst with 2,045, followed by
Cyprus with 1,969 and Ireland with 1,964.

  AFP's calculations are based on official figures, but some infections could
have gone undetected, for example if patients were asymptomatic.

  Covid-related deaths are however decreasing in Europe.

  Europe recorded on average 3,413 coronavirus deaths a day over the past
week, a seven percent drop from the previous week. At its worst, that average
saw 5,735 deaths a day in January last year.

  People on the European continent are now, on the whole, more vaccinated
than the worldwide average.

  Sixty-five percent of Europeans are partially vaccinated, while 61 percent
are fully vaccinated -- more than 58 and 49 percent respectively worldwide,
according to the "Our World in Data" website.

  Taking into account excess mortality linked to Covid-19, the World Health
Organization estimates the overall death toll worldwide could be two to three
times higher.