COVID-19 no longer represents a global health emergency, the World Health Organization said on Friday.
It's a major step towards the end of the pandemic that has killed more than 6.9 million people, disrupted the global economy and ravaged communities
The WHO's emergency committee first declared that COVID represented its highest level of alert more than three years ago, on January 30, 2020.
The status helps focus international attention on a health threat, as well as bolstering collaboration on vaccines and treatments.
Lifting it is a sign of the progress the world has made in these areas, but COVID-19 is here to stay, the WHO has said, even if it no longer represents an emergency.
The death rate has slowed from a peak of more than 100,000 people per week in January 2021 to just over 3,500 in the week to April 24, according to WHO data.
Israeli troops and tanks pushed on Saturday into parts of a congested northern Gaza Strip district that they had previously skirted in the more than seven-month-old war, killing and wounding dozens of Palestinians, medics and residents said.
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico is no longer in immediate danger but still in a serious condition, his deputy said on Sunday, four days after an assassination attempt that sent shockwaves through Europe.
At least 47 people have died after continued heavy rain and flooding in northern Afghanistan, an official said on Sunday, a day after a similar number were killed in a central province.
Russian airstrikes killed at least ten people and injured many others in a recreation area just outside Ukraine's northeastern city of Kharkiv on Sunday, local officials said.