Risk assessment of global coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic in July 2021

  Objective   To assess the global epidemic of Coronavirus disease 2019(COVID-19) in July 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 neighbouring countries. The assessment results for each country are expressed as “countries of global concern”, “countries of the general concern in each WHO sub-region” and “neighbouring countries of special concern”.

  Results   Compared with June 2021, apart from the Americas (South), the number of newly confirmed cases in other regions has shown an increasing trend. Among them, the number of newly confirmed and death cases in Africa continued to increase significantly, which needs critical concern. Globally, there were trends that it took much less time for a 10 million case increase and more time for a 500 000 death increase. In many countries, the growth rate of newly confirmed cases in July exceeded 100%. The United States, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, Russia, Iran, Spain, and South Africa are ‘countries with global concern’. Russia, Laos, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan are ‘land-boarding countries with special concern’.

  Conclusion   Since July, the COVID-19 epidemic has rebounded. Apart from the continued deterioration of the African epidemic, Americas (North), European, Eastern Mediterranean and Western Pacific all rebounded sharply. The pandemic of COVID-19 is still serious in the world. It is necessary to continuously monitor the situation in countries with global concern, adjust entry control policies in time and establish a communication mechanism with relevant agencies for information sharing and timely warnings.