"It's with great hope that I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
COVID-19 no longer qualifies as a global emergency, the World Health Organization said Friday, marking a symbolic end to the devastating coronavirus pandemic that triggered once-unthinkable lockdowns, upended economies worldwide and killed at least 7 million people worldwide.
"It's with great hope that I declare COVID-19 over as a global health emergency," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
"That does not mean COVID-19 is over as a global health threat," he said, adding he wouldn't hesitate to reconvene experts to reassess the situation should COVID-19 "put our world in peril."
The U.N. health agency says that thousands of people are still dying from the virus every week, and there have been recent spikes in cases in Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
COVID was the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S. in 2022, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported this week.
President Joe Biden signed a bill in April officially ending the U.S. national public health emergency over COVID.
This story was originally published by CBS News on May 5, 2023 at 9:58 a.m. ET.
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