Should we ignore SARS-CoV-2 disease?

Current World Health Organization (WHO) reports claim a decline in COVID-19 testing and reporting of new infections. To discuss the consequences of ignoring severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection, the endemic characteristics of the disease in 2023 with the ones estimated before using 2022 data sets are compared. The accumulated numbers of cases and deaths reported to the WHO by the 10 most infected countries and global figures were used to calculate the average daily numbers of cases and deaths per capita and case fatality rates () for two periods in 2023. In some countries, the values can be higher than the upper 2022 limit and exceed the seasonal influenza mortality. The increase in in 2023 shows that SARS-CoV-2 infection is still dangerous. The numbers of COVID-19 cases and deaths per capita in 2022 and 2023 do not demonstrate downward trends with the increase in the percentages of fully vaccinated people and boosters. The reasons may be both rapid mutations of the coronavirus, which reduced the effectiveness of vaccines and led to a large number of re-infections, and inappropriate management.