Risk assessment of global COVID-19 pandemic in February 2021

  Objective  To assess the global epidemic of COVID-19 in February 2021 and the risk of importation.

  Methods  According to the daily COVID-19 data publicly released by Johns Hopkins University, combined with the policy stringency index published by the University of Oxford, an epidemiological description method was used to provide a comprehensive and timely assessment of the global epidemic risk through a general overview, a comprehensive assessment of the epidemic trends in WHO regions and key countries, as well as a comprehensive analysis of the epidemic and prevention and control policies in 14 land-bordering countries. The assessment results for each country are expressed as “countries of global concern” “countries of general concern in each WHO sub-region” and “neighboring countries of special concern”.

  Results  Compared with the previous month, the number of confirmed cases decreased by 43.8% and deaths witnessed a 25.9% decline globally in February 2021. The European had the largest number of confirmed cases and deaths, followed by the Americas (North) and Americas (South), both of which need to be focused on. The time taken for every 10 million new confirmed cases globally showed an overall increasing trend, and the time taken for every 500, 000 new deaths remained unchange. Among the 14 land-bordering countries, the country that needs special attention is Russia.

  Conclusion  The global COVID-19 pandemic is still spreading. Although the global growth rate of confirmed cases is showing an overall downward trend, it is necessary to continuously monitor the countries with global concern, and improve the communication mechanism between epidemic prevention entities, take timely and effective prevention and control measures against the epidemic.