This Country Is Reporting The Most New COVID Infections In The World

With COVID cases surging across the globe, one surprising country is seeing more new daily cases of coronavirus infections than anywhere else in the world.

According to the World Health Organization, Indonesia is recorded the highest number of new infections of COVID-19 in the world for the week that ended July 18, as reported by CNBC.

From July 12 to 18, more than 350,273 new cases of the virus were reported in Indonesia, up 44% from the week prior, according to the WHO’s epidemiological update from Tuesday. The U.K., Brazil, India, and the U.S. followed the country in the top five, respectively.

Globally, 3.4 million new COVID-19 cases were reported in that same time frame as virus cases spike in many parts of the world, WHO data indicated.

Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world and has confirmed a total of over 2.9 million positive cases of the virus, and over 77,500 COVID-19 deaths, Johns Hopkins University data showed.

However, Indonesia trails the U.S., India, and 11 countries in terms of the total infection COVID infection counts. The U.S. ranks as No.1 with more than 34.2 million positive cases of the virus, and over 609,000 COVID-19 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data.

While new cases of COVID in Indonesia have dipped in recent days, one public health expert said deaths will continue to rise in the country in the coming days.

Ben Cowling, a professor at The University of Hong Kong’s School of Public Health, told CNBC, “Deaths will likely continue to rise for another two to three weeks because of the lag between case confirmation and mortality.”

As of July 20, 15.49% of Indonesian citizens had received at least one dose of the COVID vaccine, according to Our World in Data. About 6% were fully vaccinated, the site said.