Coronavirus tally: Global case tally down 10% in latest week versus previous one as omicron remains dominant

The global tally of COVID cases fell 10% in the week through Oct. 9 from the previous week, the World Health Organization said in its weekly update on the pandemic. The number of fatalities was stable versus the previous week at about 9,000. Omicron remained the dominant variant, accounting for 99.9% of cases sequenced in the last 30 days and forwarded to a central database. The BA.5 descendent lineage remains the dominant subvariant, accounting for 76.2F of cases. U.S. known cases of COVID are continuing to ease and now stand at their lowest level since late April, although the true tally is likely higher given how many people overall are testing at home, where the data are not being collected. The daily average for new cases stood at 38,828 on Wednesday, according to a New York Times tracker, down 20% from two weeks ago. The daily average for hospitalizations was down 7% at 26,690, while the daily average for deaths is down 2% to 377. Globally, the confirmed case tally rose above 623.2 million on Thursday, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins, while the death toll is above 6.56 million with the U.S. leading the world with 96.8 million cases and 1,064,058 deaths.