On Aug. 2, 2024, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced results of a study that showed the introduction of COVID-19 vaccines, from December 2020 through to March 2023, reduced deaths due to the pandemic by at least 59%, saving more than 1.6 million lives in the WHO European Region.

The study, published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine, revealed that today’s known COVID-19 death toll in the Region, currently at 2.2 million, might have been as high as 4 million without the vaccines. Most of those saved were aged 60 or older, the group at highest risk of severe illness and death from SARS-

The study’s author, Dr Margaux Meslé from WHO/Europe, said, “The results are clear: COVID-19 vaccination saves lives. Our findings remind us of the integral role played by vaccines to ensure people return to a semblance of their pre-pandemic lives across the Region, in work and leisure. Without the enormous vaccination effort, we would have seen many more livelihoods disrupted and families losing the most vulnerable among them.”  

The WHO/Europe study found that COVID-19 vaccination saved most lives during the period when the Omicron variant was dominant, from December 2021 to March 2023. 

Countries that implemented early vaccination programmes covering large parts of the population – such as Belgium, Denmark, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Malta and the United Kingdom – saw the greatest benefit in terms of overall number of lives saved.CoV-2.