Uneven vaccine coverage and a relaxation of preventive measures have brought Europe to a "critical point" in the pandemic, the World Health Organization has said, with cases again at near-record levels and 500,000 more deaths forecast by February.

The report identifies the ethical challenges and risks with the use of artificial intelligence of health, six consensus principles to ensure AI works to the public benefit of all countries. It also contains a set of recommendations that can ensure the governance of artificial intelligence for health maximizes the promise of the technology and holds all stakeholders – in the public and private sector – accountable and responsive to the healthcare workers who will rely on these technologies and the communities and individuals whose health will be affected by its use.

The World Health Organization (WHO) issued a Digital documentation of COVID-19 certificates, including:

• the list of attributes to be include in a vaccine certificate, linked with the FHIR resource still under construction
  
• guidelines with description on use cases and workflow.

All viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, change over time. Most changes have little to no impact on the virus’ properties. However, some changes may affect the virus’s properties, such as how easily it spreads, the associated disease severity, or the performance of vaccines, therapeutic medicines, diagnostic tools, or other public health and social measures.