ECDC provides support to EU/EEA countries in monitoring their progress towards the hepatitis elimination targets and has just published a report based on the second data collection.
New SARS-CoV-2 variants of interest and concern have continued to emerge in the first few months of 2022 and monitoring their circulation in all countries through genomic surveillance remains important.
A new online modelling hub launched today, the European COVID-19 Scenario Hub, will present modelling projections on how the COVID-19 pandemic may evolve in terms of cases, hospitalisations and deaths.
The European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) issued an update to the health safety measures for air travel, paving the way for a relaxation of the need to wear medical masks on board a flight, but noting that a face mask is still one of the best protections against the transmission of COVID-19.
A continuous high incidence or a large surge in cases in the early summer would imply a large benefit from an early second booster roll-out but optimal timing will largely depend on trends in infections ECDC says in the latest technical report on a second mRNA COVID-19 vaccine booster dose.
European Immunization Week is marked across Europe every year in the final week of April. It aims to raise awareness of the importance of immunization for the general health and wellbeing of the European and wider population.
EMA and ECDC have reviewed currently available studies and epidemiological data to provide a common position for EU/EEA countries on the current need and potential benefit of a fourth dose (second booster dose) of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines.
ECDC and EMA’s COVID-19 task force (ETF) have concluded that it is too early to consider using a fourth dose of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines (Pfizer’s Comirnaty and Moderna’s Spikevax) in the general population.